NHC upgraded Potential Tropical Cyclone 19 to Tropical Depression 19. The name change is a result of increasing organization and tropical characteristics, and the system will probably become a tropical storm later today or tonight. Here are NHC’s Key Messages regarding Tropical Depression Nineteen (en Español: Mensajes Claves). The watch and warning situation hasn’t changed overnight …
The impact forecast in the short term is mostly focused on Honduras, where heavy rains (and the associated flash floods and mudslides) are likely as the storm stalls just off the northeast shore, and later Belize, where a tropical storm landfall is forecast:
There is a lot of uncertainty as to the latter part of the track, and even more as we get in to next week. The track models have all shifted drastically north and west since last night. As I cautioned yesterday, any time you have a storm stall, with strong forcing coming later, tracks can shift wildly – and the storm intensity forecast can radically change as well. Yesterday, the GFS model showed the storm over Florida as a hurricane; today, it shows the storm as, um, it doesn’t – it takes it out into the Gulf and kills it. Here’s the latest GFS run for next Wednesday evening, and by comparison the run from yesterday/ you can click either to embiggen:
As I constantly rant, NHC only does forecasts to 5 days for a reason: beyond that, most of the time, there is so much uncertainty the forecasts just aren’t actionable and you end up jumping at shadows. And in this case even beyond day 3 is iffy: if the storm drifts inland over Honduras (which is possible) it might break up there. If it stays offshore enough (less likely but possible) it would be stronger and could hit Belize as a hurricane. Not knowing, cannot say.
So, bottom line, if you are in Central America be prepared for heavy rains and if on the coast tropical storm conditions. Everybody else in the Gulf should monitor (which, again, does not mean hitting refresh every five minutes – it will likely be this weekend, after the storm starts moving after the stall, before we really know something).
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