By Michael Doll, Meteorologist
October 4,2013; 9:40PM,EDT
Tropical Storm, located over the central Gulf of Mexico Friday will move into the southern United States this weekend with heavy rain, gusty winds, rough seas and perhaps severe thunderstorms.
Karen will continue to move along a curved northward path over the central Gulf of Mexico through Friday. During Saturday, Karen will begin to turn toward the northeast.
Landfall is expected along the upper Gulf Coast from southeast of New Orleans to west of Panama City, Fla., spanning Saturday night into Sunday.
According to AccuWeather.com Hurricane Expert Dan Kottlowski, "Two landfalls are possible because of the projected path. One would be over southeastern Louisiana and the other would be between southern Mississippi to the western part of the Florida Panhandle."
Winds associated with Karen reached 65 mph Thursday. Karen weakened somewhat Friday with maximum sustained winds decreasing to 50 mph. The threshold for a tropical system to become a hurricane is sustained winds of 74 mph.
RELATED:
AccuWeather Hurricane Center
AccuWeather Severe Weather Center
2013 Hurricane Season Ranks as One of the Least Intense
"Dry air and wind shear will continue to interact with Karen, but it is possible the system's intensity again briefly spikes prior to landfall," Kottlowski said.
Karen is expected to make landfall as a tropical storm.
Near and just east of where Karen makes landfall, minor coastal flooding is possible. Wind gusts in the neighborhood of 50 to 65 mph can cause minor property damage, downed trees and power outages.
Showers and thunderstorms will become more frequent from the Florida Panhandle to southeastern Louisiana Saturday.
As Karen continues to head toward the coast, seas will gradually build over the central and eastern Gulf of Mexico.
As seas build, the frequency and strength of rip currents will increase along with the possibility of beach erosion.
Coastal flooding will be minor compared to major hurricanes that have struck the region in recent decades. A coastal inundation of 3 to 4 feet is possible if the storm arrives during a published high tide cycle from the mouth of the Mississippi River in Louisiana to Apalachee Bay in Florida. A lesser water level rise would occur during low tide.
Rainfall can be heavy enough to alleviate recent dry conditions in some locations of the South. However, the rain may raise the risk of flooding for parts of the region, not only near the Gulf Coast, but also inland as the storm moves northeastward over the interior South.
A pocket of 6-inch rainfall can occur close to the center of the storm track.
Sometimes as tropical systems make landfall, tornadoes can be produced.
"Tornadoes are a possibility, north and east of the landfall Saturday into Sunday morning, focusing on the Florida Panhandle, but perhaps a far west as southern Alabama and southeastern Mississippi," Kottlowski stated.
AccuWeather.com meteorologists have been tracking Karen all week.
Karen first started as a cluster of showers and thunderstorms across the southern and central Caribbean. Disruptive winds kept development to a minimum but as the disturbance moved into the Gulf, warmer waters and less land interaction allowed some strengthening to occur.
Winds aloft still remain unfavorable which has kept Karen from rapidly intensifying.
Other storm systems across the United States will dictate where Karen and its associated moisture heads after landfall.
This weekend over the mainland United States, a strong cold front will first move across the Mississippi Valley.
This will help pull the moisture from this Gulf of Mexico system northward and enhance rainfall from the Gulf Coast to part of the interior South.
The aforementioned cold front will eventually bring showers and some thunderstorms to the mid-Atlantic and Northeast late on Sunday into Monday.
Karen is likely to enhance the rainfall across parts of the mid-Atlantic and and perhaps New England early next week, where the rain is most needed and the weather of late has been more like summer rather than autumn. Strong winds are also possible in any thunderstorms that fire up along the I-95 corridor.
Content contributed by Alex Sosnowski, expert senior meteorologist.
No comments:
Post a Comment