ATL: Remnants of PAULA - Discussion

[Evil Jeremy]

Looks to my untrained eyes that Paula is now moving north in the final few frames here.

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/flt/t2/flash-vis.html

[GCANE]

Core temp up to 2C now; about the point where a visible eye should show up soon.

[AdamFirst]

Looks to my untrained eyes that Paula is now moving north in the final few frames here.

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/flt/t2/flash-vis.html

Cloud shield seems to be expanding too.

[northjaxpro]

Looks to my untrained eyes that Paula is now moving north. Perhaps just a hedge west of due north.

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/flt/t2/flash-vis.html

If she is moving more north, that would be very good news for the coast of the Yucatan and for the people in Cozumel. Not surprising if Paula is moving more north since now she has become a very potent small and compact cyclone.

[SouthDadeFish]

Although visible imagery is rather impressive. Banding continues to improve. Maybe that expected hot tower will fuel another round of intensification.

[cyclonic chronic]

looks like the tiny, tiny eye is trying to clear out on both vis and w.v.

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/flt/t2/wv-l.jpg

http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/flt/t2/rgb-l.jpg

this reminds me of charley in her size. driving up 75 or more on 41, there was nothing but blown off roofs, power lines, down trees, standing trees with awnings wrapped around them, etc., etc.,. but it was only from like 5-6 miles north and south of the peace river. very tiny but vey intense. i remember reading somewhere that smaller hurricanes do a better job of mixing winds down to the surface, i think it has to do with the pressure or something. ill try to find it again and post it as it was very interesting reading.

[jinftl]

One thing I really am seeing here with this storm is that Mother nature is dictating the direction that this story goes - no one called for a stong cat 2 by tuesday afternoon - no models suggested it...and given all of that uncertainty that has already played out, the future of this storm is highly unknown and highly uncertain.

i think the NHC will continue to focus on the short-term threat to the hurricane warning area and continue to mention the high degree of uncertainty of the forecast intensity and track going out in time.

The model runs could start to vary even more once the current intensity is thrown into the computer models....none were expecting to be dealing with a cat 2 at this point/

Bottom line - there is no way that any resident of florida can not help but take notice of this situation. Climatology and history clearly indicate that this storm is in a position to threaten. That doesn't mean it will turn out to be a threat - but to rule anything out based on model runs that have performed poorly would be unwise.

Being that the intensity forecast was inaccurate, do you think that this will change the NHC's thinking as to their track on the 5 p.m. advisory? Or do you think that it will pretty much stay the same??

[GCANE]

Although visible imagery is rather impressive. Banding continues to improve. Maybe that expected hot tower will fuel another round of intensification.

Yes more than likely.

ADT should show a high T# once it starts seeing a visible eye with a very cold cloud top next to it.

[petit_bois]

Do the pro mets no longer post forcasts in the tropical analysis thread?
I've very curious what they are thinking...
Where is Ort when you need him!?

[SouthDadeFish]

Definite hot tower in N eyewall after looking at 19:31Z imagery.

[Sanibel]

Paula is blending the environment that created the 1924 Cuba storm with an unfavorable airmass to its north. The result is a compromise of a small SST-driven hurricane sustaining itself in a narrow pocket of self-created favorability. These things are hard to predict, but as someone pointed-out NHC did list category 2 as the top-out intensity. Knowing NHC's conservativeness I guess we can assume Paula might eventually break through major.

If I was to add to the stew I would say if Paula loops back down into the Caribbean as NHC predicts I would watch out for an unexpected easing in shear as Paula loops back north. That would be the wildcard with unexpected results if it happens.

Paula has separated away from the convection boundary to the NE and now has outstanding structure.

[northjaxpro]

From the Key West NWS WFO this afternoon

AFD:

LONG TERM (THURSDAY THROUGH TUESDAY)...
A MID LATITUDE TROUGH WILL CROSS THE GULF OF MEXICO AND PUSH DRY AIR
ACROSS THE REGION. THIS WILL CREATE A VERY HOSTILE ENVIRONMENT FOR
HURRICANE PAULA. THIS TROUGH WILL ENHANCE THE SHEAR ALOFT OVER THE
STORM AND BEGIN TO BLOW OFF THE TOPS OF THE DEEP CONVECTION
ASSOCIATED. THE CURRENT TRACK FOR THE STORM IS TO DRIFT SLOWLY
NORTH...TURNING EAST BY THURSDAY AND EAST THURSDAY NIGHT BEFORE
PARKING NEAR THE WESTERN TIP OF CUBA. FOR THE LOCAL ENVIRONMENT...WE
WILL BE RETURNING TO A DRY AIR MASS BY FRIDAY. THEREAFTER A RIDGE OF
HIGH PRESSURE WILL BUILD ACROSS THE EAST COAST STATES WITH THE AXIS
EXTENDING ACROSS THE KEYS. HAVE WINDS NEAR 15 KNOTS BEGINNING ON
SUNDAY. THE RIDGE WILL SLIDE SOUTHWARD THROUGH TUESDAY WITH A BIT
MORE MOISTURE RETURNING TUESDAY NIGHT. HAVE REDUCED POPS TO DIME SIZE
FOR MONDAY AND TUESDAY.

[GCANE]

Definite hot tower in N eyewall after looking at 19:31Z imagery.

That's a big one.

[Vortex]

Looks like an eyewall hot-tower popping thru on the NE quad.

looks like Paula is about to undergo another round of significant intensification...very impressive vis images there....

[hurricaneCW]

Wow this morning it looked like it was falling apart and now I come home to find a Cat 2 hurricane. You gotta love the fluctuations of these tiny systems. We could easily see it go down to a TS and then back up to a Cat 2 in a matter of 12 hours of so, pretty cool to witness. I see the track is a bit further north too, looks like Cuba could see some effects from it as well as parts of the Yucatan.

[Sanibel]

The "Fist" proves itself once again. I think some of the warm-top stumbling from this am was due to land interaction delay of recovery.

[expat2carib]

If Paula is accelerating into RI I'll give 22 of my 50 credits to KWT.

Yesterday he predicted it to be a very strong system by tonight.

He doesn't get the 50 because he changed his mind so many times underway

[eastcoastFL]

I remember wilma was supposed to be a ts by the time she got to florida. hmm

[GCANE]

As long as those hot-towers keep firing, they will obscure the eye.

Thing is they will continue to heat the core and lead to most likely RI.

I wouldn't be suprised to see a 4C core develop within 12 to 18 hrs.

With a good outflow channel, that should support Cat 4.

IMHO, land interaction is not so much of an effect anymore now that WISHE is dominating energy inflow.

[Macrocane]

Just wow I just got home and found this, Paula is such a fascinating little surprise this must be one of the greatest models bust of all time, who would've thought that we were going to have a significant hurricane with such little model support. It's great it's happening on Tuesday because it's the only day I don't have classes in the afternoon. I hope everyone is prepared in the Yucatan peninsula.