I am revisiting an earlier quote here...Well, it is not necesarily true that the system would have to break free of the ITCZ. Remeber, the ITCZ is a convergance of the trades, this creates lift fort-storms, and also can help these systems in getting their spin. So the ITCZ is actually one of the birthplaces for tropical activity. With that said, if a wave looses it's cyclonic appearance and stretches from east to west in an ovular pattern, this is likely the beginning of the end for the potential development of that feature...as the system would be regenerating into the overall ITCZ signature, this most often happens during periods of strong trade winds, which allow the cyclone to elongate.

As for 96L...it's not getting any stronger tonight, but it shows no signs of elongating (weakening) either. In fact, the circulation pattern seems very symetrical, even though the thunderstorms are not. Give it some more time to hang in there and we may be looking at a TD tomorrow or on Thursday...Clark said the right stuff again tonight, right after his post, some of the activity went poof, but the thunderstorms to the south have resurged and the tops are cooler than before. So he is on track. To back him up further, I'd say that if it is gonna develop, expect up and down surges from hour to hour (hours to hours long), with an overall trend toward improved thunderstorm activity and slow development over the long hual. If you are looking for quick development, or quick sure fire trigger identifiers to indicate the development or dissipation of 96L, I do not think you are gonna see that from satellite frame to satellite frame. This is tennacious enough to last this long, it hasn't faded yet, and likely will not spin down quickly based on these facts...More opportunities for slow development exist in the next several days, so stay tuned, this may become a TD at some point.