was about to freak because the recent zoomed out visibles were showing a dark spot at the center of beta. zoomed in using ghcc's neat features to discover it's a shadow from an overshooting top. whew, thought we had another wilma-esque pressure nosedive starting.
it's a comment already made, but the shallow ocean off the east coast of nicaragua should keep beta's intensity from getting too nuts... if the storm isn't one of those compact systems that has a small, hellishly powerful inner core. not sure which direction it's going right now. worth noting that the usual bottoming-out of the storms that intensify rapidly to high categories takes 3-4 days. early forecasts were getting the storm onshore tomorrow.. but most recently it's pushed back to later sunday. that's enough time to get a very strong system, if it takes the plunge. also interesting that the gfdl has it crossing into the pacific ocean late in the period. it'd have to get some real westward momentum to make it, and i'm not too convinced the steering will ever get strong enough to push it over. something to keep an eye on in case it starts becoming a fixture in the models.
for folks who want to lament how unprecedented the current late season storms are, i'll draw you attention to mitch (at it's category 5 peak seven years ago today), lenny (mid november 1999, the west to east caribbean hurricane), and michelle (forming in the last days of october 2001, for a cuba crossing on november 4). also take a gander at hurricane joan, which smashed into southern nicaragua as a category 4 on october 23, 1988. what we're seeing is quite typical, just extra bothersome on top of the atypically bad season we've been having.
thought i'd chime in on 91L also. it's not holding down quite the persistent convective mass one would like to see for a system to form, but remains coherent and does appear to have a noticeable wind shift and fast north/slow south profile suggestive of formative low pressure. the shear fields for the next couple of days look friendly to it, but with beta revving up i wouldn't be convinced that it won't start getting beaten on by the other system. earlier runs showing it tracing the subtropical ridge and curving up ahead of a shortwave off the east coast are less convincing now that it'll definitely interact with beta, and may get drawn further west or not allowed to develop. we have days to watch it.
HF 1752z27october