Hurricane Ophelia passed 538.169 miles east of Coast Guard Beach today. This brought out surfers and spectators to CGB in Eastham MA. The swell has not reached Katia levels yet, but is matching Maria. Katia and Maria both passed on the same track Ophelia is taking. But Ophelia is the strongest of the three at our latitude, so we may have some larger waves here Monday Morning.
On a Global Scale, these hurricanes are a close call for New England. We are getting to the time of the year we may start to relax and stop worrying about a Major Hurricane into our Coast line. Irene was major, but lacked the coastal impact of the Majors that hit back in the 50s, 40s, and 30s. But our clock is surely ticking. We are now at the time of year for hybrid storms (which is what Irene turned into). The weather pattern of the last week was right for a tropical cyclone to run up the east coast, thank goodness none were in position. We had another very wet month with 5"-10" of Rain in September, including many 2"-3" amounts in the last 4 days. But we are now in October, so some of this goes in the October record book. It may appear we have had an upper low to our west for tow weeks now. Truth is we had one upper low there for ten days, it was kicked out last Thursday by another storm that crossed southern Canada from The Pacific Ocean. This 'Kicker' then dug and cut off deeper and colder than the first. Can you believe it was colder in Florida and Georgia, than in New England, this weekend. Daytona Beach cooled to 56^, breaking the record of 57 on October 2, 2011. The low in Boston was 60^. Early season snow fell from North Carolina to Pennsylvania. Snowshoe West Virginia reported 3" of snow cover at the summit Sunday Morning. This upper low is a cold pool of air spinning like a rotary in the sky, 'cut-off' from the westerlies now streaming across Canada. The next kicker is a very subtle feature, another weak cold front from Canada will press into New England Tuesday night and Wednesday, this new cold will fuel 'Bombogenesis' of the weak surface low pressure system that has been bringing rain to the northeast for the last few days. This low will deepen from 1013 millibars over our benchmark (40^ North Lat, 70^ West Lat) Tuesday morning, to 981 millibars over Cape Race Newfoundland Thursday Morning. Yes, Cape Race is getting hit by hurricane Maria Monday October 4, then an even more powerful (due to slow movement & large scale) storm three days later. Only the latter will have blizzard conditions in the high country of inland Newfoundland. It will be interesting to see which storm causes higher wind, the hurricane or the Nor'easter. For New England, we have light rain showers Monday, becoming heavier Tuesday as the storm taps the Gulf Stream on the south side, and new cold on the north side. As the storm pulls out Wednesday our wind will increase rapidly as cold dry Canadian air rushes in. We may see rain end as snow in Eastern Maine, and in The white Mountains. A huge strong High Pressure system will take over Thursday into next week. On the front side we have cold wind Thursday, a frosty start Friday, then a beautiful Columbus Day Weekend. Record warmth is possible by Columbus Day. After that we start the whole process all over again, backside moisture, a new cold cut off to our west, the threat of another tropical system, and a transition into warm and wet to cold and wet, and snow by Halloween. The Astronomical High tide on September 29th, this is Scituate. This is with now storm. The tide will be even higher Halloween Week, 12.4' vs 12.2 last week.
Any storm will cause coastal problems. Then another huge tide will be here Thanksgiving week. This is a second year LaNina, known for extreme autumn and winter storms. Here we go again. Yes, we should have a great ski season, coast to coast.
