Clark,

You left out an important option. Ivan backs SW from VA through Louisiana and emerges into the western gulf changing the flow. Here's an encapsulation of JB's comments from today. Personally, I'm not sold on the low level swirl. It looks like a Pacific hurricane that degenerated days ago. Can it come back? Maybe. Will it come back? Maybe (see comments below).

Spock,

You're falling into the same trap the NHC is with the right bias of all the models. I'd give < 15% shot at the Carolinas.
------------------------------------------------------
For Clark:

Now I live here and don't want people thinking I'm wishcasting anything my way. I wouldn't even make that call just due to impartiality that is sorely lacking on every hurricane fan site. I don't even agree with Joe that the setup will verify. My way of thinking would be IF Jeanne was to cross FL or the Straits, it would be slow but not make it as far west as here. That's a 8-10 day out opinion. Jeanne could easily be long gone by then anyway. But he draws some interesting LA parallels, so I figured I'd throw out a legal synopsis for anyone interested:

1) (Previous Idea) - Similar H20 temperature profile & neutral-slightly negative SOI to his analog 2002.

2) Galveston record high (last set in 2002, Isidore shows up a week later)

3) He likes a cross between 1947 and Betsy for a track at this point.

4) His pulse idea of the increments of 3-6 degrees west with each landfall as the SW Atlantic High backs to its summer crescendo.

5) Models have been north and right biased all year in their early phases. Corrections would be farther west, but even if Ivan gets north of 30 and hit N FL, the circulation would back SW. Joe doesn't see it getting above 27, and the turn to the west (painfully slow) is not for another 5 or 6 days.

6) He likes Jeanne at Cat 2 or 3 when it turns west (which means look out in C&S FL).

7) Accomplished via Ivan weakening and splitting (as I wondered yesterday if that was why the models showed the loop-d-loop) and backing Ivan's upper feature dives SW (trof split) into the Gulf. The eastern ridge is powerful. Ivan's upper remains change the windflow in the Western Gulf. The ridge in the SW builds and bridges NE overtop of the mid-Altantic States (similar pattern from the 3 storms named in the title).

8) Said pattern argues for storms (when there) to move west into the central Gulf.

Steve