Internal processes and some external wind shear has kept intensity in check throughout the day Wednesday, but that may be changing. Recon and satellite data indicates that Harvey is strengthening tonight. With water temps in the GOM exceptionally warm, and shear increasingly more favorable, Harvey will likely have a mostly conducive environment for strengthening up through landfall, or maybe more than one, as indicted by some models.

Wind at recon flight level of about 2,400' elevation in the northeast quadrant is now running at or above 50 knots. Taken together with some reliable SFMR estimates of at least 35 knots at the surface, Harvey has become a tropical storm again.