arlene has really been playing softball with us all along. tightly clustered model runs during its entire life, intensity not far out of the realm of expectations... forward speed has been more or less what the nhc called for also (maybe slower than forecast at first, but arlene picked up the slack today). it's still got that lopsided profile that rabbit and others were progging, and it doesn't seem to be shaking it. the upper limit of intensity for storms like that was probably well represented by earl in 1998... an atypical cat 2 that came in as a 1. arlene is more than likely coming in as a one.. maybe even at perdido key like i was reckoning (knock on wood, hombres). weather will all be over in places like.. oh, escambia, santa rosa, okaloosa counties.. walton, bay.. damn i know those counties almost by heart. inland south alabama.. it's coming fast enough that towns like brewton, atmore, monroeville... probably a breezy afternoon and evening. probably lots of severe weather as it goes north and weakens.. it will get to fairly high latitude with a good bit of its upper circulation intact (ohio, indiana, etc).. bank right.. dump good rains even though it's really trucking.. and i'm betting some severe weather as the upper winds get stronger out of the west and all that deep tropical moisture is charging north. sunday and monday should feature more arlene inspired severe weather, which the hpc will document (and the weather channel will credit to the 'remnants of arlene'). you guys know the drill.
pretty much everybody got arlene right, 'cause arlene hasn't been playing games with us. middle of the plate, up in the zone, not too much heat.. yeah, this one's almost out of the park. 'course, you folks in pensacola (or poor rickonboat, regretting his newfound ability to have his predictions come at least partially true).. probably don't see it my lackadaiscal way. at least it's only june.. a similar storm in august would have nobody close to amused.
prolly crack hurricane by daybreak officially (some recon obs suggest it already passed the threshhold).. so whoever has the closest date to june 10th/11th for first hurricane gets the trophy. way to guess. beat me by a mostly month.. er 4 weeks.
droop, haul out the camera, and drop us some scans if you can shoot anything worthwhile tomorrow.
later y'all.
HF 0344z11june