FLHurricane.com: Franklin, the Little Storm that Could

Franklin's been trying to get better organized this morning, coinciding earlier with the diurnal convective maximum, with a big flareup of convection on the east side of the system. It appears that the center has tried reforming a bit moreso on the north edge of the convective flareup -- a bit further east than at 11a in that advisory package -- and could be a sign of the storm trying to reach hurricane intensity. Current forecast track thinking remains largely unchanged, ultimately taking it out to sea, but not really as a consequence of the global model guidance and moreso a result of mesoscale model guidance (MM5) that keeps the storm intact plus the evolution of the midlatitude pattern over the coming days.

Meanwhile, the disturbance in the Bay of Campeche has lost a bit of its convection with the interaction with land, but still maintains a very healthy low-level signature. The recon flight out there has been canceled, but the TCSP/CAMEX field experiement group will have a high-level plane in the vicinity today, gathering potential genesis data. It's an excellent case for their purposes, particularly if this disturbance makes the leap to cyclone status. It still has a chance, not as great of one as before admittedly, but it could quickly get up there to TS status -- much like Bret earlier this season.

Out in the central Atlantic near 40W, the broad area of low pressure has reformed, per QuikSCAT data, but most of the convection and organization is just to the southeast of the wave. The Saharan dust layer is loosening its grip on the region, but any development is still going to be slow to occur. Of more interest in the short (and perhaps long) term is a wave just off of the coast of Africa, SE of the Cape Verdes. Convective complexes have been persisting in that area moreso than they did earlier this season, and this one is already fairly well organized. The FSU MM5 -- best at genesis cases -- calls for some slow development over the next two days with more rapid development later. Curiously, it slows it down quite a bit later on, but I would pay more attention to the development than I would to that. How well it holds together today into tomorrow will tell us how serious this disturbance could be at getting its act together and whether or not it'll be our first true Cape Verde storm of the year (Emily excluded for this case).

As HF said in the old thread last night, the east Atlantic is now open for business...all the way until the end of September. Waters are still above normal out there, shear is low, and the atmosphere is moist. Good bet we'll see something form out that way before the end of the month.

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