Tropical Storm Harvey was intensifying rapidly on Thursday morning and a Hurricane Warning was issued portions of the coast of Texas.\u00a0 At 11:00 a.m. EDT on Thursday the center of Tropical Storm Harvey was located at latitude 24.0\u00b0N and longitude 93.3\u00b0W which put it about 365 miles southeast of Corpus Christi, Texas.\u00a0 Harvey was moving toward the north-northwest at 10 m.p.h. (16 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 65 m.p.h. (105 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 80 m.p.h. (130 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 982 mb.<\/p>\n
A Hurricane Warning was in effect for the portion of the coast from Port Mansfield to Matagorda, Texas.\u00a0 A Hurricane Watch was in effect for the portion of the coast from the mouth of the Rio Grande River to Port Mansfield.\u00a0 A Tropical Storm Warning was in effect for the portion of the coast from the mouth of the Rio Grande River to Port Mansfield and from Matagorda to High Island, Texas.\u00a0 A Tropical Storm Watch was in effect for the portion of the coast from Boca De Catan, Mexico to the mouth of the Rio Grande River.<\/p>\n
Tropical Storm Harvey intensified very rapidly on Thursday morning.\u00a0 An eye with a diameter of 18 miles (29 km) formed at the center of circulation.\u00a0 The eye was surrounded by a ring of very strong thunderstorms.\u00a0 Additional bands of strong thunderstorms were revolving around the core of Tropical Storm Harvey.\u00a0 The thunderstorms were generating very strong upper level divergence which was pumping away large amounts of mass in all directions from the tropical storm.\u00a0 The strong upper level divergence was causing the surface pressure to decrease rapidly.\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure decreased from 1002 mb to 982 mb in 12 hours.\u00a0 The rapid decrease in pressure was increasing the pressure gradient force and the winds speeds were increasing accordingly.<\/p>\n
Tropical Storm Harvey is in an almost perfect environment for rapid intensification.\u00a0 Harvey is moving over water where the Sea Surface Temperature is near 31\u00b0C.\u00a0 The upper level winds are very weak and there is almost no vertical wind shear.\u00a0 Tropical Storm Harvey should continue to intensify rapidly for another 24 to 36 hours.\u00a0 Harvey will become a hurricane later today and it will likely become a major hurricane before it makes landfall.\u00a0 Tropical Storm Harvey has the potential to intensify to a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Scale.<\/p>\n
Harvey is being steered toward the north-northwest by a subtropical ridge to the east of the tropical storm.\u00a0 A general northwesterly motion is forecast continue for another 36 to 48 hours.\u00a0 On its anticipated track the center of Harvey will approach the coast of Texas on Friday night.\u00a0 The steering currents are forecast to weaken as Harvey nears the coast.\u00a0 Some models are forecasting that Harvey drifts slowly toward the west.\u00a0 Other models stall Harvey and then turn it northeastward.\u00a0 There is a large degree of uncertainty about the future track of Harvey after it nears the coast.<\/p>\n
Based on current projections the forecast Hurricane Intensity Index (HII) for Harvey at landfall is 22.1.\u00a0 The forecast Hurricane Size Index (HSI) is 18.0 and the forecast Hurricane Wind Intensity Size Index (HWISI) at landfall is 40.1\u00a0 Those indices indicate that Harvey could cause regional major damage in Texas.\u00a0 The indices may be conservative if Harvey continues to intensify rapidly up until it makes landfall.\u00a0 Harvey would be stronger, but a little smaller, than Hurricane Ike was when Ike made landfall in Texas in 2008.\u00a0 The HII for Ike was 19.2, the HSI was 22.5 and the HWISI was 41.7.<\/p>\n
Harvey will bring strong damaging winds to Texas.\u00a0 Harvey will also cause a dangerous storm surge at the coast.\u00a0 The storm surge could approach 12 feet (4 meters) in some locations.\u00a0 Harvey will also drop very heavy rain, if it stalls after it moves inland.\u00a0 Serious fresh water flooding is possible under that scenario.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tropical Storm Harvey was intensifying rapidly on Thursday morning and a Hurricane Warning was issued portions of the coast of Texas.\u00a0 At 11:00 a.m. EDT on Thursday the center of Tropical Storm Harvey was located at latitude 24.0\u00b0N and longitude 93.3\u00b0W which put it about 365 miles southeast of Corpus Christi, Texas.\u00a0 Harvey was moving […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2],"tags":[491,492,384,113,24,493,112,778],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4585"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4585"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4586,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4585\/revisions\/4586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}