FLORENCE INFO, FYI

(updated landfall timing in red)

I well imagine some in ACA will be having some coastal visitors come and stay as Hurricane Florence barrels toward Cape Lookout/Cape Hatteras with a landfall Friday. Many mandatory evacuations are already underway, and for good reason.  If you draw crosshairs through the center of a hurricane (N-S, E-W), the worst of the worst place to be is the NE quadrant (Q1 for you math experts). Morehead City up through Hatteras are in the most dangerous situations, and where there are those mandatory evacuations.

While every station/news outlet has endless banter about this storm, I wanted to share with you a catch-all website that is a trove of hurricane information pulled together, for those that like to explore.  Even if you might not understand all the technical information, you'll find this useful:

Mike's Weather Page

The following is but a sample of what you'll find poking around there (I'll focus on Florence; other storm data is listed there, as well).  

First, you'll notice the URL is 'spaghetti models', and spaghetti plots are just like they sound: 'noodle' lines of the predicted hurricane path by the myriad  models and algorithms.  Florence has had a tight grouping ever since it's birth (NOT common), and the concerning aspect is this storm will most likely be making a direct, perpendicular hit near the Cape Lookout and Cape Hatteras areas. (click on pics to enlarge)

Spaghetti plots for Florence

The most widely used/seen graphic is the predicted path put out by the National Hurricane Center:

This graphic shows spaghetti-like plots on the predicted intensity of Florence.  While on this run nothing reaches a Cat 5, many are strong 4's, and reaching a 5 status is not out of the question:

You'll find a link to the Hurricane Hunters which provide a wealth of technical data on their slicing of the storm itself:

And, of course, there are links to surface weather maps.  A cold front is bringing us our increased rains right now, but that cold front will soon stall with the strong wind field of Florence, focusing torrential rains for somebody somewhere once it comes ashore and slows down:

All that to say Florence is most likely going to produce catastrophic damage not only from the winds and storm surge, but the flooding rains once inland.

The effects in ACA? It will be breezy for sure, with winds ultimately swinging around to the NE, then N, then NW.  My concern for us is the potential for lots of rain and wind IF the remnants continue moving westward toward the northern Blue Ridge. As I type the QPF predictions aren't alaming for us in the 5-day outlook:

5-day precipitation outlook

In short, ACA is still a pretty good place to be in the Carolinas for this hurricane, barring the remnants moving directly at us.  I'll update those concerns in a later post.


Bob