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Well, it's clouded up in the last few hours and the winds are running between 20 and 30 mph. The difference today is that the clouds are much lower and faster. Yesterday the cloud deck wasn't getting too far past the intracoastal today its advancing pretty far west. Also, looking at radar it appears the first band looks to be about 10 miles or so off shore. Myrtle Beach is only about 20 miles from the N.C border.

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I have family in the Myrtle Beach area (actually in North Myrtle) and I've been talking to them almost hour by hour, trying to keep them on top of what's going on. Strangely enough they aren't interested in the current weather (they only want me to answer "where's the hurricane going), so thanks for the obs. As you noticed with the lowering clouds, the low-level flow over the coastal carolinas has moistened considerably since yesterday. Dewpoints are up about 10 degrees in the last 12 hours, so some of those gusty showers may indeed make it ashore later on.

As for the hurricane, it pays to be cautious in looking at short term trends, but it looks as though Ophelia is gradually becoming better organized. The 15-20kt of westerly shear that's been plaguing the hurricane for the past day or so has dropped off to 10kt or less, and as a result the cloud pattern is becoming more symmetrical, with outflow now well-established in the western semicircle. Though the two latest recon fixes don't show any appreciable change in pressure or winds, they do report a closed eyewall. Intensity is famously difficult to forecast, but it looks as though Ophelia might be poised to strengthen a bit in the next 24 hours.

There's also the suggestion in recon, satellite and radar that Ophelia is drifting westward or west-southwestward. This might very well be insignificant, but given the recent trend of the GFS to push the track farther west, it's something to be watching for.

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