Tropical Storm Don Fizzled; Tropical Storm Emily Meanders

Tropical Storm Don, which formed in the Gulf of Mexico, completely fizzled once it made landfall along the Texas/Mexico border.  I thought I was the only one that would have been surprised by such an event, but analysts at NOAA and tropical meteorologists I know and whose material I read were also surprised by that turn of events.  Most of the rain that fell on land was on the southern half of the storm – the part over Mexico.  Due to this, I expect the drought conditions over southern Texas to be largely unchanged as a result of Tropical Storm Don – a truly unfortunate result.

Tropical Storm Emily formed during the evening of the 1st of August.  She was a vigorous tropical wave over most of the eastern and central Atlantic Ocean.  She fought dry air and moderate wind shear to gather enough organization to be classified a Tropical Storm about 36-40 hours ago.

Here are T.S. Emily’s current vitals:

Center located near 16.7N, 69.7W; moving W @ 14mph; maximum sustained winds of 50mph.

T.S. Emily’s cloud features present fairly cold cloud tops, with decent outflow, but lacks spiral bands still.  Emily’s official forecast path takes her across the southwestern coast of Haiti in the next 12-24 hours, across the southeastern coast of Cuba tomorrow, and along the western islands of the Bahamas Friday.  Thereafter, Emily passes by the east coast of Florida, then is supposed to curve back out over the Atlantic by early next week.  A number of factors can change that forecasted path, especially given the difficulty in tracking where her exact center is so far in her life.

T.S. Emily’s intensity depends largely on how she interacts with the rugged mountainous terrain of the island of Hispanola (Haiti & the Dominican Republic).  Many storms have fallen apart after traversing near the island.  Still, other storms have been able to maintain their integrity and gone on to make landfall at one or more other locations.  If Emily survives Hispanola, she will likely maintain Tropical Storm strength through her travels back into the Atlantic.  A long-term strengthening to hurricane status is indicated in the long-term, but this is by no means assured.

Tropical Storm Don Will Land Along Far Southern Texas Coast; Will Drought Be Impacted?

Tropical Storm Don continues to fight dry air and northerly wind shear as it moves WNW across the Gulf of Mexico.  As of this morning, it looks increasingly likely that T.S. Don will make landfall somewhere along the far southern Texas or far northeastern Mexican coast late tonight or early tomorrow morning (local time).

This track is somewhat unfortunate for most of Texas, since T.S. Don is expected to curve toward the WSW as it continues moving inland over Mexico.  The far southern portion of Texas is experiencing drought conditions (see map from yesterday), but they are of lesser magnitude than portions of Texas to the  north.  Still, rainfall is needed in southern Texas and northern Mexico also.  Hopefully T.S. Don will begin shifting conditions in the region.  Tropical moisture entering the region can be recycled a number of times as the North American monsoon continues to push storms up from Mexico into the southern U.S.

For those interested in tropical meteorology, another tropical disturbance is moving across the Atlantic, moving west toward the Lesser Antilles.  The National Hurricane Center is giving the system a 30% chance of developing into a named storm in the next 48 hours.

2011 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Tropical Storm Arlene in Gulf

There was an area of interest in the southwestern portion of the Gulf of Mexico yesterday that the U.S. National Hurricane Center gave a 40% chance of forming into a tropical system within 48 hours.  Well, it took less than 12 for the disturbance to spin up into the Atlantic’s first named storm of the 2011 season: Arelene.

Tropical Storm Arlene‘s vitals as of 9A MDT are:

Center’s location: 21.2N, 95.7W (the western part of the Bay of Campeche)

Moving: W at 8mph

Maximum sustained winds: 50mph

By 7A MDT tomorrow, the storm should make landfall along the Mexican coast.  There is a small chance that Arlene will intensify to Hurricane strength prior to landfall.  The primary threat of this storm will be heavy rain over areas that are experiencing extreme drought conditions.  This will likely result in flash flooding because the ground is extremely dry and plants are dormant and will thus be unable to absorb so much rainfall.