hasn't been an unusually active season down in the australia area, but monica is very intense and ought to feed the debate over whether tropical cyclones are getting stronger worldwide. i don't buy it personally, but that is one hell of a cyclone. good news is, it has to travel near shore before going in, region is not exactly dotted with settlements, and eyewall processes ought to take this storm down a few notches before it finally comes in. the amsu imagery suggests that an outer eyewall is forming, and later today or tonight the inner one will probably snap and allow the storm's windfield to flatten and loosen up some. the bad news is, when this thing goes through the darwin area it may have katrina-like effects as opposed to camille-like effects, as the old storm of record there is tracy from 1974, which was small and extremely intense (much like camille). even if the storm winds weaken a great deal, there ought to be significant storm surge damage near the coast. i would not want to be below 20' above sea level if i had to deal with monica.
that thing is hauntingly pretty. very symmetric, annualar profile.... reminiscent of isabel.
HF 1723z23april