there was a lot of off-topic type stuff above. of course, this is a system far into the atlantic, since it would be storm 25 if it developed, it would still have some significance climatologically--the news outlets might pick up on it as a feature, blame it on global warming somehow. ya know.
stewart wrote the last discussion on it just a little while ago--a little surprising as he usually doesn't sit on things, but he seems to be following the leader for now. if it doesn't have enough tropical characteristics at this point (i.e., frontally detached, partial convective ring, banding eye)... not sure what it'll take. since it's still embedded in a large deep layer complex, they may be deciding to use that as reason for why it isn't a tropical cyclone at this point. earlier storms that formed in this way were usually the dominant feature within such a deep layer low... this one still has a pair of upper vortmaxes and an elongated surface trough/front around the east side... while the storm 95L has pivoted seperately around to the southwest. there is a clearly some anticyclonic outflow from the convection... you can see it fanning slightly as it swirls out into the upper vortex to the east within the complex. could also be that they see the progress to the south and are waiting for it to cross warmer sst isotherms for some reason. it's on the 25C isotherm right now... roughly 77F, which isn't by any means an unprecedented temp for a storm. also noticed ssd didn't issue a number on it last cycle. can't understand why (it was t 2.5 in the prior rating).
either way, when you see a discrete feature that looks as good as vince or peter did, it makes one wonder why the hesitance. whether they operationally rate it or not, it's going into the archives as one. not sure why they're pretending it isn't a tropical storm already.
anyway, tropical storm delta is out there today. same old story.
stuff in the caribbean is still 'there', but not in a big way. the low north of panama got blasted into extinction by a strong mid level dry jet associated with the front that punched down there. it wasn't related to gamma, by the way.. gamma's swirl actually decayed into that jet as it was pushed down the nicaraguan coast. but anyway, still general low pressure in the area, which will have some ridging build aloft a tad later this week. could look a little more interesting around saturday. there's also that weak low/wind shift south of puerto rico still. if it were september/october that would be more interesting.. but this late in the year with the shear it's taking.. nah.
HF 1712z23november