Tropical Depression 25 Forms While Prolonged Hurricane Force Winds Affect Cancun

There is no good way to know - yet - exactly where the impact will be in Florida, or if it will hit the mainland at all (e.g. a path over the Keys)

HOWEVER, there are a few things that are reasonably-well known.

1. The front is vigorous. It is 79.5F here right now. Yesterday at this time it was in the mid 80s. Humidity is WAY down (50% at present) and the wind has shifted and is out of the NNW - the front has passed us. This happened fairly early this morning and a surface map confirms this - the frontal axis is pretty much across Appalachicola right now. The trough is clearly visible on WV imagery; there's no doubt where it is. It also is not moving much in terms of eastward progression at this time; again, WV imagery confirms this.

2. The front is running basically on a SW-NE axis, NOT SSW-NNE. If WIlma was to exit right now and get picked up, I would expect a NE motion - not a ENE one.

Wilma is drifting northward at the present time, and has yet to make a solid connection with the trough.

The key as to WHERE she goes will be determined by how far down the front has travelled before she gets picked up, and how long it is before the pickup happens. Were the connection to be missed, behind this front is a STRONG high - that would confound ALL the existing models. I do not see that happening though - but I mention it because if the trough were to lift NE - not impossible - it could leave WIlma behind. Again, though, there is no model support for that scenario.

The models prognosticate the front reaching nearly to Tampa by late tomorrow. Should this happen, Tampa obviously would not take a direct hit, as the storm will run south of the frontal boundary. HOWEVER, this does not mean that anything south of that boundary is "in the clear" - quite to the contrary - anything along that boundary is likely to get positively hammered with nasty weather, as all this tropical moisture feeding into what is already a vigorous trough can produce incredible amounts of rainfall, tornadoes, hail, and extreme straight-line wind levels. As a consequence I would be expecting ugly weather from wherever your "current surface map" shows the front to be all the way well south of there.

As well, Wilma at last report had a 200nm radius windfield for tropical storm force winds. That's big! Add baroclinic enhancement and sustained 35kt winds with gusts into the 60-70kt range are not unreasonable at all to expect over most of the Peninsula when the storm comes across.

I do think that the extreme NE event that I was fearing may come to pass is less likely, simply due to time - it is likely that the low associated with this trough will be off the seaboard by the time WIlma comes up. That's a piece of good news for the rain-soaked NE coast.

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