All Eyes on Matthew

Hurricane Matthew is showing signs of strengthening Saturday evening. The central pressure is lowering, the winds have increased to 150 mph and the eye is tightening up.

This is the strongest Atlantic Hurricane since Felix in 2007. According to the National Weather Service, "only 6 Atlantic basin hurricanes since 1851 have undergone rapid intensification of at least 70kt in 24 hours." That's an impressive statistic.

The track of Matthew has been pushed to the East — good news for Jamaica, very bad news for Haiti. Not only will the island see destructive winds, it could see up to 40 inches of rain, which will result in life threatening flash flooding.

Matthew is forecast to pass between Jamaica and Haiti Monday afternoon. There is good agreement in that part of the forecast. What's the forecast after Monday? There is still a lot of uncertainty.

If you're an armchair meteorologist, you might be biting your nails if you've looked at the GFS model. The GFS and some of it's ensemble members show a land falling hurricane next weekend in southeastern Massachusetts. The European forecast model has shown the storm getting pushed out to sea once it leaves the Bahamas. Historically the Euro has proven to outperform the GFS with the forecast track. Having said that, there is a concerning trend in the latest Euro guidance. The latest track is still out to sea, but it has trended several hundred miles west.

Best case scenario, we see some high surf. Worst case scenario, hurricane landfall in New England. At this point, I'd have to go with the best case scenario!

Contact Us