Well, am starting to lean towards a track forecast that would contend with the far greater wisdom of the present models. I am going to go out on a limb here, and anticipate that 97L will be tagged as a depression by tomm. ( Sunday morning ), and as it continues to slowly strengthen, will pass north of Hispanola, perhaps crossing only the extreme most northeastern corner of the island.

Despite the close clustering of the majority of the models, I am starting to get an increasing concern that 97L will develop farther north than currently anticipated. Furthermore, should this occur, along with having to re-establish the models "intial" point, current motion would need to be taken into consideration as well.

At the moment, I beleive the initialization point ( and more westward motion ), could be replaced once the system is eventually tagged as a depression. Once this occurs as well as follow up "fixes" continue to verify actual motion, my concern is that the newer forecast tracks will indicate greater threat to Puerto Rico and less of a threat to HIspanola. Should this pan out, than the level of concern for potentially a stronger hurricane to eventually occur would be greater due to less land interaction. I don't think this would change the threat level for South or East Coast of Florida. For that matter, the most recent long range GFS steering would make me think that any storm that might approach Florida from the ESE, would continue into the Eastern Gulf. Thereafter, strong ridging to the north could cause an ongoing westward motion to a virtual stall in the E. Gulf .