irene is plodding west this morning under a progressively weaker shear pattern. franklin did the disco this morning and he's always conservative, but irene should be upgraded later today. i'm kind of scracthing my head on the forecast track as it takes irene right through the center of a 500mb ridge axis. the globals that don't kill irene are stalling the center near bermuda then drifting it west in 4-5 days. notable that gfs builds a longwave ridge near the east coast going into next week... if irene is still under that it'll be paying a visit. i'm going to hold off on calling for recurvature anymore until i see the storm get through that first ridge... the track through it looks spurious... and the shortwave being progged to get irene isn't very substantial and isn't going to dig.
other features to eyeball... wave nearing 50w has all of its convection away from the axis. weak swirl trailing irene is becoming indistinct. weak low in the ne caribbean now south of d.r., under about 20kt of shear. signature is still apparent, but the shear should kill it today. two itcz clusters (one near 35-40w, another near 20w).. gfs likes neither, fsu mm5 likes both. convection is still largely inhibited in the eastern atlantic. home brew chances still very low as the weak low remains parked near the ga/al border with a trough axis dangling into the gulf... little convergence off the east coast. the shortwave moving by may trigger something, but it would be a coast-runner.
news on the pattern evolution is... upper trough in the western caribbean appears to be finally weakening, and the western part of the basin is becoming more favorable for development. the westpac is still active and after rising to near neutral soi took another plunge... maybe a last gasp before mjo negative anomalies shift east at last. the eastpac has activated as evidenced by the depression nrl is tracking well southwest of the baja. timer usually works that the atlantic will respond in 6-10 days... august 15-20 timeframe in this case.
HF 1341z09august