WxSynopsisDavid

No, not a sign of ERC. Rather the opposite, sign that Milton is still bombing out and about to achieve its peak intensity.

It has, yes. Another solid indicator Milton is about to sustain very rapid and intense pressure falls. Likely only a few hours away from achieving peak intensity.

I agree as well, very plausible

Perfect symmetry of CDO and overall as textbook as you can get with an ATL Basin hurricane.

This is not only historic but absolutely jaw-dropping what we are witnessing in the Atlantic Basin right now. Only a handful of times in the satellite era have we seen a hurricane achieve upper-echelon intensity. 5 times to be exact with Milton likely being the sixth. 2005 Wilma- 882mb 1988 Gilbert- 888mb 1935 Labor Day Hurricane - 892mb 2005 Rita- 895mb 1980 Allen- 899mb

963mb is the landfall intensity on that run. That’s Cat 3, not Cat 1.

180kts (207mph) surface wind estimate, yeah we very rarely see that in the ATL Basin, even when it’s suspected SFMR

914mb extrapolated

Very impressive and historic

Category 5

I honestly can’t remember the last time ive seen a hurricane go from a TS to a buzzsaw with a pinhole eye in 12 hours. This has been not only an impressive intensification process to witness but one that is certainly historic.

GFS has the peak intensity Tuesday morning as Milton is just offshore of the Yucatan. Than as it turns NE, an ERC commences. Once it completes, Milton rapidly intensifies right before landfall and regains its lost intensity. Shear doesn’t get to it until right at landfall, very similar to what happened to Helene. This is becoming a common theme with Gulf hurricanes, particularly those landfalling Floridas west coast.

Only mitigates the wind threat. Really the focus should not be on intensity but rather surge and flooding. ERC will likely happen, and the storm will grow in diameter before landfall. Another factor is how slow Milton is moving now vs model predictions. Milton is moving slower which gives time to complete an ERC and regain lost intensity should shear and dry air be overdone at landfall. If it’s not, Milton rolls in at Cat 2/Cat 3 but brings that high-end surge and flooding threat.

Really, the debate of underperformance should be silent until we see the 00z model suite that gets ingest with the recon data being collected to the north. Either the data we seen today is spot on with shear and dry air or it overdone the limiting factors. Won’t know until that 00z data comes out.

This reminds me a lot of what happened with Katrina. It hit that Gulf Loop Current and exploded into a Category 5. Someone mentioned in a previous post that the jet pattern at landfall could mitigate wind damage. Remember that Katrina was knocked down from a Cat 5 to Cat 3 at landfall due to an EWRC. It was likely induced because of the increasing shear at landfall. With that said, this could potentially be another historic storm surge scenario. By the time it landfalls, even if it weakens slightly, the surge is already piled up at that point and pushing into the coast.

Usually this is their stair step approach to introducing high-end intensity into their forecast. Not good to have a Category 3 hurricane moving over the Gulf Loop Current.

Track scenarios are split: north of Tampa Bay or right over Ft. Myers. Both tracks would be devastating with catastrophic storm surge. Saving grace would be an eyewall replacement cycle but in actual reality that wouldn’t help much. Environment supports Milton landfalling at peak intensity. To complicate matters, the critical angle of approach to compound the storm surge threat.

Very concerning that Regional Hurricane Models slow Milton down over the Gulf Loop Current. Rapid to Explosive Intensification happens as Milton begins to interact with the loop current. Just not a great track to see heading into SW FL highest population center.

No upwelling from Helene, SSTs and OHC still holding.

This thing is taking off now. 6hrs ago this thing was a blip. Now this system is looking like a strong Tropical Storm.

You consistently answer your own questions. The reason for the underwhelming appearance is the lack of recording stations and the fact chasers were not positioned to receive max winds. The area of max winds bypassed chaser positions. This is more in relation to that chasers were positioned for safety, NOT to be in the max winds. Max winds were on east side of eye where max storm surge is occurring. The combination of the two is an unsurvivable situation. But this is a common theme we see, year after year, going back to Harvey in 2017 with people saying these major canes look underwhelming.

The peak winds went east of those who were streaming. Reason why we don’t see confirmation of the 140mph winds in any of the video we have seen.

They most likely did, but Recon Hunters just didn’t find the exact location in the east/northeast eyewall.

Mesovortices rotating around the eye. Indicator of additional strengthening

Absolutely agree, 150-155 at LF.