Today’s HEAT ADVISORY will be allowed to expire at 7PM this evening, but not before many neighborhoods reached the mid 90°s. Still, the heat did not seem quite as oppressive as what we experienced during Sunday, Monday and Tuesday afternoons. But don’t be fooled: the very warm start to the day, the morning warm-up and dew points in the mid to upper 70°s had Heat Index numbers climbing above 100° before noon.
And that morning minimum of 80° for Wednesday is not only the “warmest” minimum of 2012, but the highest minimum at Metro Airport since August 2011! Just how rare is a minimum in the of 80°s for Baton Rouge? It’s only happened 22 times since 1930 (83 years), with the highest recorded minimum of 82° occurring only twice during those eight decades! (An additional point: there were no minimums of 80° or more between 1930 and 1962!)
The upper-level “Heat Ridge” centered over the Southern Plains has kept us dry over the past couple of days and will continue to keep most of us hot-and-dry for the next few days. We think that the ridge may weaken slightly and ease a bit westward over the next two days (Thursday & Friday), allowing for a slight chance of rain during both afternoons. Earlier in the week we expected that ridge contraction and weakening to continue into the weekend, but some of the computer guidance now suggests that the ridge might re-strengthen from late Friday into Saturday, keeping a clamp on rain chances through Saturday afternoon and evening.
So for now, we’ll keep rain chances posted as “isolated” through Saturday, with a slightly better chance of rain on Sunday afternoon. By Monday, the ridge weakens and shrinks enough to allow for scattered afternoon showers and t-storms, with scattered rains remaining in our forecast through the rest of the 7-day forecast.
A disturbance in the central tropical Atlantic -- about 800+ miles east of the Lesser Antilles -- has shown slow-but-steady organization throughout the day, prompting the National Hurricane Center (NHC) to ‘upgrade’ the disturbance to Tropical Depression #5. Given its rate of development today, we wouldn’t be surprised to see T.D. #5 become T.S. Ernesto as early as tomorrow. (Historically, roughly 9-in-10 Atlantic Basin depressions become tropical storms.)
Forecast guidance consensus takes T.D. #5 into the north-central Caribbean over the weekend, with slow-but-steady intensification. Although intensity forecasting is far more uncertain than forecasting direction, there is a modest (far from unanimous) consensus among the intensity models suggests that the system could become a moderate-to-strong Ernesto in 4 to 5 days.
In any case, it is far too early to consider this storm as a Louisiana threat. Even if the storm continues on its current directional trend and forecast, it wouldn’t reach the southern Gulf before sometime close to the middle of next week. So don’t get too alarmed at this point ... but now is a good time to assess your family and business ‘state of preparedness.’
And don't forget...you can track T.D. #5 and any other tropical systems in our Hurricane Tracking Center: http://www.wafb.com/category/137830/hurricane-tracking-center
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