Dithering Dangerous Dorian

HURRICANE WATCH ISSUED FOR SOUTH CAROLINA AND GEORGIA COASTAL AREAS.

Nobody can let their guard down. Dorian will continue to be a major hurricane despite an expected weakening trend.

When and where Dorian turns North is the key unknown to its future longer term track and will make the difference between a hit or a miss for millions of people. People have to be evacuated NOT because forecasters say so or that they have high confidence in a particular outcome, but because it takes so long to move people out of harms way given huge population and limited road space.

WATER and NOT wind is the major destructive force and killer from hurricanes and tropical storms.

#1 is the storm surge #2 is inland flooding from heavy rain #3 is wind. Not all storms have equal amounts of all three, each is different.

A hurricane or tropical storm is NOT a POINT on a map, it is a large broad area of MOSTLY tropical storm winds and a tiny fraction of maximum winds on which the news sadly puts too much focus.

A hurricane is not a point it is a broad large area.

The margin of track difference is razor thin as to the eye (the worst of the storm) reaching land or staying offshore, so small it is too small for the state-of-the-art of meteorology to resolve.

So many subtle atmospheric factors near and far from the storm come in to play which I’ve covered for readers for a week now.

A wobble West could mean a wind gust to 100 mph, wobble East and only the equivalent of a severe thunderstorm 58 mph or just 30 mph even on the coast.

SOME impact on Georgia Coast and no impact for Atlanta as things stand now but obviously this can change.

It stalled this Monday AS FORECAST, but now the key is that Northward movement which we await, then and only then may we firm things up.

NHC SCIENTIFIC DISCUSSION:

European Model Ensemble and most others suggest low odds of a direct hit anywhere on the U.S. mainland but with the normal margin of error it would be foolish for anyone to let their guard down yet.