as far as all the discussion over what defines a cat 5 and whether emily would make the cut... the fact that the pressure has thus far bottomed at 929 and not gotten to 920 means nothing really... a storm with a higher pressure can have cat 5 winds, it's just a function of how tight the inner core gradient is. in this case it's very tight, so a slightly higher than traditional pressure is producing near cat 5. the standard for flight level to surface windspeed reduction is 90%. 150kt X .9 =135kt or 155mph. this doesn't always work out and they call it as best they can based on what the dropsondes and recon onboard instruments say... and adjust by how good the satelite presentation is. not a standard formula to it, really... forecaster interpretation comes into play beyond that. all in all they do pretty good, though.
anyhow... expected track mostly unchanged. probably going to get the yucatan higher than i was talking last night, and the mexican mainland perhaps a little south (that left bank under the continental ridge has become more pronounced in the models). on the other hand i can see some weaknesses above the 500mb level (weak upper lows linked from the gulf to yucatan) that may reshuffle the deck. forecast track still looks pretty close to reality, though.
i'm not certain yet, but it looks like 99L is breaking through the upper trough. the convective area from this afternoon looked like the shear had won, and was left behind by the low-level cyclonic kink... but more developed after dark closer to 23/54.. and this is moving wnw. if enough has made it through, the main influence will on this system will change to the ridging off the east coast and the northerly flow west of the upper trough... a less mitigating factor as time progresses. i'd say this thing is up to 50-50 now on spinning up. the models don't have it drawn up right, but the piece that got through ought to be enough. be wary of this thing on the east coast if it starts developing.
SAL more influential behind the 99L system and is squelching subsequent waves, even though their signature is decent. the east atlantic will have more trouble generating a system for now (until the larger august waves start coming off), but these can still fester further to the west. fortunately the globals aren't latching onto anything.
HF 0555z17july