Major Hurricane Milton

[Seminole]

10 minutes ago, schoeppeya said:

HAFS-B still wants to ride the north side of the bay but the hurricane models are becoming outliers on that at this point

I thought that once we are inside 48 hours the Hurricane Models are preferred over the global models. 

[LeesburgWx]

Starting to look much better on IR now

[cptcatz]

34 minutes ago, SnowGoose69 said:

Depends, it may be hooking somewhat hard at LF so I think if it comes in over SRQ its probably missing metro TB, if it comes in N of metro Sarasota then definitely it could hit eastern side of the metro

Ok so maybe the eyewall misses the metro, but if it landfalls at Longboat Key where models show it today and then moves into South Bradenton, that puts the entire Tampa metro within about a 45 mile radius of the center.  NHC says hurricane force winds extend out 30 miles right now and they explicitly said they expect the windfield to double in size.  That puts all of Tampa metro in hurricane force winds.  Not to mention that path takes it right over Orlando metro next.  Surge aside, this is going to be a mess in those large populated areas.  

[jbenedet]

There’s some caveats to hoping for ticks south if you’re in the south/east section of the current forecast track. The heaviest rainfall is displaced to the north/west side of the CoC. This amount of rainfall carries significant fresh water flooding risks—bunch of small lakes and ponds in the north Tampa area, away from the coast.

 

[cheese007]

It sounds like consensus is putting this out of the "worst worst" case scenario (eye passing just north of Tampa bay) if taken verbatim? What kind of difference in surge can TB expect if it's south instead of north? 

[eyewall]

Ok definitely aiming for a rebound to Cat 5 for a bit.

[eyewall]

Just now, cheese007 said:

It sounds like consensus is putting this out of the "worst worst" case scenario (eye passing just north of Tampa bay) if taken verbatim? What kind of difference in surge can TB expect if it's south instead of north? 

They would get an initial surge but then a blowout tide as the center approached and winds turn offshore.

[WxWatcher007]

Recon reporting FL winds of 145kt on that latest pass.

[bobbutts]

[GaWx]

6 minutes ago, jbenedet said:

There’s some caveats to hoping for ticks south if you’re in the south/east section of the current forecast track. The heaviest rainfall is displaced to the north/west side of the CoC. This amount of rainfall carries significant fresh water flooding risks—bunch of small lakes and ponds in the north Tampa area, away from the coast.

 

The 12Z UKMET gives Tampa 12.1” of rain!

[user13]

16 minutes ago, psv88 said:

I was down in Sarasota this past spring. The bay there is very high even just at high tide. The entire downtown will be underwater. 
 

the construction downtown is pretty new so I would imagine structural damage would be limited even with cat 3 winds. That’s one saving grace, most of the development on the west coast is new and in accordance with the better building codes. Obviously the immediately shoreline will be wrecked, but the newer construction should be fine

All those building are so cheaply made

[jm1220]

1 minute ago, bobbutts said:

Eye looks to really be clearing out. I’d think it’s pretty likely it makes it to Cat 5 again. 

[Windspeed]

There's not really much to add. The evolution of Milton's structure over the past three hours speaks for itself. The next recon flight should be interesting.

[SchaumburgStormer]

2 minutes ago, Windspeed said:

There's not really much to add. The evolution of Milton's structure over the past three hours speaks for itself. The next recon flight should be interesting.


 

That much lightning is telling. It’s bombs away right now

[SluggerWx]

Wow the amount of lightning in the eye has really jumped over the last hour. It's starting to look as abundant as it was yesterday during intensification. 

[SnowGoose69]

Euro again LF around Anna Maria to Bradenton Beach.  Still wonder if such a hard hook is realistic or as typical the storm will try to ride out over water or hold a NNE component longer before it moves ashore

[WolfStock1]

24 minutes ago, psv88 said:

I was down in Sarasota this past spring. The bay there is very high even just at high tide. The entire downtown will be underwater. 
 

the construction downtown is pretty new so I would imagine structural damage would be limited even with cat 3 winds. That’s one saving grace, most of the development on the west coast is new and in accordance with the better building codes. Obviously the immediately shoreline will be wrecked, but the newer construction should be fine

I believe downtown was underwater even with just Helene - so it certainly will be with MIlton yes.

The biggest heartbreak there is going to be that much of the "Old Florida" in the area is going to be gone after this storm.   As you mentioned a lot will be due to lesser building codes of years past; in particular all the houses were closer to sea level, and also lots of them wood frame instead of cinder block.

[CoastalWx]

Decent move ESE too.

But the eye rapidly clear out. He's going to town again.

[jasons]

I was down in Sarasota this past spring. The bay there is very high even just at high tide. The entire downtown will be underwater. 
 
the construction downtown is pretty new so I would imagine structural damage would be limited even with cat 3 winds. That’s one saving grace, most of the development on the west coast is new and in accordance with the better building codes. Obviously the immediately shoreline will be wrecked, but the newer construction should be fine

Sorry, but most of the construction down there is not new and not in accordance with great building codes. There are tons of older ranch homes built at grade on canals. Now, many more of them have been torn-down and replaced in the last few years with multi-million-dollar 3-story monstrosities that take-up every inch of the lot space. But there’s a tremendous amount of ‘legacy’ home construction still around from the 1950’s-70’s era when they developed those areas.
And the vast majority of strip centers, restaurants, etc. west of the Tamiami Trail are old school too. It’s old development.
Downtown Sarasota is a redevelopment zone so you can’t compare that to other areas.
The amount of property damage in Sarasota, Siesta, Longboat, AMI, etc., will be staggering.

[SnowGoose69]

HWRF/HAFS-B 12Z runs are closest on MSLP and likely evolution next 12-18 hours, one is directly into the bay, the other still wants to be more north (HWRF)

[WxWatcher007]

 

I think the recon data on that last fix (still waiting for VDM) along with the unambiguous clearing and warming of the eye supports at least 155mph at 2pm, if not an upgrade to 160. I could see them waiting until the next recon though. 

[weatherwiz]

3 minutes ago, CoastalWx said:

Decent move ESE too.

But the eye rapidly clear out. He's going to town again.

The last several scans are jaw dropping. Was looking at the IR one second and look over like 5 minutes later to see rapid developing of convection, convection wrapping around, and the eye clearing out...yikes. 

It also seems to me like the storm is not necessarily fighting the stronger wind shear to the north but its structuring itself to avoid the shear or have the shear lessen its influence...wild. 

[Moderately Unstable]

4 hours ago, WishingForWarmWeather said:

Question for anyone who feels like responding -

I guess I’m used to ERC from larger eyes, or ERC’s that are more disruptive instead of the meld that happened overnight - but I suppose I was expecting more wind expansion than we see. 

Would you pontificate that’s more bc of the pinhole to not-pinhole-but-still-really-tiny eye, or bc of the meld, that the explanation was relatively “small” compared to what we’ve seen in the past. 

Or is this more I am just not fully understanding the dynamics at play here? Or is this bc the storm was already so compact that a near double feels small? Mixture of these things? 

Well, a few thoughts. First, EWRCs are complicated and an active area of research. In fact, some of the data from past hurricane hunter flights has been used for it. 

Let's start with step one. This was a fairly classic EWRC. Very very strong, very small storm with extremely tight eye developing a classic distinct secondary closed outer energy maxima. But the step two is a bit more open. Does eyewall #2 "rob" eyewall #1, does eyewall #1 simply disintegrate due to energy starvation, does turbulent flow between the two eyewalls interact in a destructive manner? 

Overall, we saw pressure rise to about what would be expected, I think I mentioned 930 mb in chat yesterday actually. And we did see the outer wind radii expand. As you noted, it's a small storm. As of now it is still a small storm, and yes that did likely play a role. Going from 4 nm to 16 is different to, say, 10 nm to 45. We also know EWRCs can take on different forms, as you note. This was not a merger though. We did have two distinct eyes, radar returns and IR showed eye one weakened with warming cloud tops as eye 2 closed and strengthened with symmetric lightning around that convection last night (which suggests it had relatively strong updraft rates throughout - sufficient for a good amount of charge separation that we don't see as much of in steady state hurricane environments). 

EWRCs can be favorable or unfavorable. Unfavorable occur with relatively larger moisture gradients or dry air intrusions and/or increases in wind shear. Given the higher shear status early today, but lack of dry air intrusion, the EWRC here seemed fairly neutral - as shear relaxes, it will likely restrengthen as it appears to be doing now with clearing of the new eye. 

This is the extent of my knowledge on the topic, others can chime in with more if they have additional insight. Did this answer your question relatively?

[jm1220]

2 minutes ago, jasons said:

Sorry, but most of the construction down there is not new and not in accordance with great building codes. There are tons of ranch homes built at grade on canals. Now, many more of them have been torn-down and replaced in the last few years with multi-million-dollar 3-story monstrosities that take-up every inch of the lot space. But there’s a tremendous amount of ‘legacy’ home construction still around from the 1950’s-70’s era when they developed those areas.
And the vast majority of strip centers, restaurants, etc. west of the Tamiami Trail are old school too. It’s old development.
Downtown Sarasota is a redevelopment zone so you can’t compare that to other areas.
The amount of property damage in Sarasota, Siesta, Longboat, AMI, etc., will be staggering.

Don’t want to drag this off topic but the construction type also only really helps with wind. A massive surge will damage any type of property overcome from the water. The only way in the future any of these properties might be insured is if they’re on stilts. 

[olafminesaw]

1 minute ago, weatherwiz said:

The last several scans are jaw dropping. Was looking at the IR one second and look over like 5 minutes later to see rapid developing of convection, convection wrapping around, and the eye clearing out...yikes. 

It also seems to me like the storm is not necessarily fighting the stronger wind shear to the north but its structuring itself to avoid the shear or have the shear lessen its influence...wild. 

Also been moving south a bit the past couple hours away from the dry air and shear, probably the biggest reason for the rapid improvement 

[NJwx85]

155mph - 925mb 2PM EST. Advisory.

[TPAwx]

GEFS tracks

[CoastalWx]

Milton was probably ready to take off earlier, but perhaps a bit of a hostile environment relatively speaking. But as usual in weather, once you tweak a few things here or there, it can be off to the races. So in this case, perhaps a bit less shear and a higher RH environment was all it needed. I know models did show strengthening. 

[weatherwiz]

3 minutes ago, olafminesaw said:

Also been moving south a bit the past couple hours away from the dry air and shear, probably the biggest reason for the rapid improvement 

I was wondering the last few days if we would see a scenario where it would adjust track/path to avoid the shear. 

[Normandy]

10 minutes ago, weatherwiz said:

The last several scans are jaw dropping. Was looking at the IR one second and look over like 5 minutes later to see rapid developing of convection, convection wrapping around, and the eye clearing out...yikes. 

It also seems to me like the storm is not necessarily fighting the stronger wind shear to the north but its structuring itself to avoid the shear or have the shear lessen its influence...wild. 

Great post.  This is why it’s hard to automatically assume a storm will be impacted by shear once it has gone to pound town already.  Hurricanes this powerful tend to have unexpected interaction with the upper level elements that induce the shear.  Love watching these interactions unfold