****Hurricane Ian likely to impact Florida with excessive rainfall, hurricane-force winds, and a dangerous storm surge…can attain “major” status…rain/wind to then push up through the eastern US**** — Arcfield Weather

Details

Fiona is gone, Gaston is nearly stationary over the north Atlantic, and a new system is located in the eastern Atlantic; however, the system of immediate concern is Tropical Storm Ian now over the warm Caribbean Sea. This system will likely become a hurricane on Monday as it heads towards western Cuba and could intensify into “major” hurricane status on Tuesday soon after it bypasses the island nation.  Conditions over the Caribbean will improve over the next couple of days allowing for Ian’s intensification as wind shear drops to low levels and the inner core will move over very warm waters. At mid-week, Ian will begin to curve slightly and head towards western side of Florida.  There is a decent chance that as Ian becomes influenced by an upper-level trough, southwesterly wind shear will develop and some weakening is a possible result before the hurricane reaches western Florida somewhere between the west-central coast and the central panhandle region. Even if some weakening were to take place before landfall, Ian will likely be a very serious storm for Florida as it will tend to be a slow-moving system. As a result, rainfall amounts can be extreme – possibly on the order of a foot or more in some areas, winds will be hurricane-force, and dangerous storm surge is possible from the Florida Keys to all along the west coast. By Friday, Ian is likely to push into Georgia and weaken into tropical storm status.