gymengineer

I think what that signal indicates, given how the last few weeks have gone, is that even if models don’t coalesce around a specific threat, the conditions are still there for a storm or two (or more) to get going in early November. Models with Milton, Nadine, and Oscar all ID’ed their potential at range, but flickered back and forth, or even to nonexistence with Oscar, until the surface low actually got established.

The most exciting weather day ever for this subforum's geographical region, IMO. I am guessing most would want to experience that level of wind for the thrill of it.

It reads in this thread that the people still posting- in a continuing discussion about storm surge- have all accepted that Milton was a tiny or small hurricane. Milton’s 255 mile extent of tropical storm force winds heading into landfall is not indicative of a small storm. Sure, the extent of hurricane force winds didn’t expand to what was originally modeled, but a 35 mile extent is not tiny, just “regularly” compact. Milton was a large storm with plenty of ground observations showing damaging winds well away from the landfall point on Florida’s west coast. The extent of strong winds didn’t start large and instead increased from the day before steadily into landfall, so this wasn’t a situation with multiple days of huge fetch pushing toward the coast. As for the storm surge discussion, as people have pointed out, coastal Sarasota County and Charlotte County have a dearth of tidal gauges. The video evidence from parts of that coast point to a 10’+ surge. So, I think the NHC Tropical Cyclone Report for Milton will be illuminating and I would guess it would justify the 10’+ forecast for a stretch of the coast Sarasota city southward.

This graphic in the Ian TCR is from the NWS surveys and supplements the USGS sourced one you posted.

As you said, footage from Manasota Key, with collapsed structures:

Agreed on the complexities of storm surge. Just look at Ivan and Katrina for examples of very high west of landfall storm surges, while many other hurricanes do not have appreciable storm surges in that direction. Or Florence's Neuce River surge outperforming, or Dorian's surge on the backside of Hatteras. The storm surge forecasts are still the "weakest" part of the NHC products because of all the variables. I also want to note that easily verifiable facts are available to us this morning. Milton's storm surge was higher at both Ft. Myers and Naples than Helene's- significantly higher at Naples. Posts in the main thread seem to be speaking about the Tampa area only when comparing to Helene.

This banter thread and the main thread are indistinguishable at the moment. It’s always the case the morning after a hurricane landfall that the vacuum of information leads to lots of guess posts. What’s most amusing is the 10’ above normal water level trace near Sarasota, with Helene’s much lower height visible, juxtaposed to these confident posts that the storm surge underperformed.

This water trace from Naples- still sharply rising- shows that Milton is not falling short of its potential for storm surge. The entire stretch of the FL coast from Venice to Naples is going to experience damaging surge.

And up the coast from Naples, the increase in rate of water rise (slope) at Ft. Myers is coinciding with low tide.

No need for wobble tracking. Using the center fixes from recon, the longer term motion has been clear.

St. Petersburg airport already at TS-force: 40 mph/gust 51 mph

What's immediately noticeable on this recon flight so far is how far northeast of the center flight-level (not surface) hurricane force winds now extend.

Here are the TCRs. Again, Nicole ended up being downgraded to a tropical storm rating for the landfall list, while Jeanne kept its Category 3 landfall/impact. Nicole: https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/data/tcr/AL172022_Nicole.pdf (page 5 is especially relevant) Jeanne: https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/data/tcr/AL112004_Jeanne.pdf (page 2 is especially relevant)

I recently queried AOML why Hurricane Nicole (2022) was missing from the list of landfalling US hurricanes; the TCR for Nicole had a 65-kt landfall at Vero Beach, FL: https://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/hurdat/All_U.S._Hurricanes.html Surprisingly, Chris Landsea himself answered. The reason is that Nicole’s hurricane force winds at the time of landfall were not hitting land. They were clearly over water. So, Nicole was assigned as 60-kts on the tropical storms list: https://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/hurdat/uststorms.html That reminded me of Hurricane Jeanne’s (2004) TCR, which explained that it was not determined whether the 105-kt winds at landfall made it onshore or remained over water. Mr. Landsea confirmed that Jeanne’s landfall was given the benefit of the doubt and therefore made it onto the landfall list as a Category 3 impact for FL. I wonder, as sources of data become richer and richer, whether we will see more discrepancies between an official landfall windspeed and what the impact rating ends up being. In other words, if every hurricane landfall is analyzed for whether the strongest winds at the time of landfall were in an onshore orientation, would that require many more mismatches between the two official sources?

The NHC has used this phrasing multiple times now: "Note that this track is closer to the model fields rather than the model trackers which appear to be too far south." I wonder if this is related to the track adjustments during Helene where, at first, they did not prioritize the verbatim global model outputs showing a landfall in Taylor County, FL, and then a track through central GA instead of toward Atlanta.