FLHurricane.com: Thoughts on Dennis

Although looking a bit ragged this afternoon, probably due to some dry air entrainment from off of the South American north coast, Tropical Storm is still expected to continue to develop and reach hurricane status later this evening or early Thursday morning. is moving to the west northwest and should continue to move in this general direction, passing close to the eastern tip of Jamaica on Thursday morning.
Eventually a more northwesterly direction is anticipated as the storm crosses west central Cuba on Friday.

I'd anticipate hurricane force winds in the Keys, especially the lower Keys, early Friday morning. Note that the forecast from the National Hurricane Center takes the storm a little further west across western Cuba early Friday morning, however, I think that the forecast beyond about 36 hours is still biased too far to the west. The same problem occurred with Tropical Storm Cindy - now a Tropical Depression in Alabama, when the tropical forecast models first indicated that Cindy would make landfall near Houston, but the eventual landfall was about 300 miles to the east in the Louisiana delta region. Part of the problem was that the computer models overplayed the expected intensity of the Atlantic ridge across Florida - it was nowhere near as strong as forecast.

An induced trough extends from Tropical Depression Cindy southwestward to Mexico across the Gulf. As the remnants of Cindy move toward the DELMARVA peninsula, the trough will orient more east northeast to west southwest and the northern portion should slide a little southeastward. What all this jargon means is that will make a more northerly turn in the eastern Gulf of Mexico - perhaps keeping rather close to the west coast of the Florida peninsula. I'd anticipate landfall Sunday evening anywhere from Apalachicola to Suwannee. If the hurricane comes in near Apalachicola, the strong winds would remain offshore. If it makes landfall at Suwannee, expect strong hurricane force winds along the west coast of the Peninsula from the Keys to St. Mark's. If the forecast verifies, landfall would be further west toward Pensacola. Still too early at this moment to determine the likely path in the eastern Gulf.

However, it does seem likely that just about all of Florida will receive rainfall from this cyclone - in some cases, significant rainfall. Right now, I'd expect landfall as a Category III major hurricane but the storm must survive its trip through the central Caribbean Sea first. More later as the storm gets closer, but right now residents along Florida's west coast should review their hurricane preparations - just in case.

ED

Edited by MikeC (Wed Jul 06 2005 04:04 PM)