Tropical Cyclone Gita formed near Samoa on Friday.\u00a0 At 10:00 a.m. EST on Friday the center of Tropical Cyclone Gita was located at latitude 14.8\u00b0N and longitude 172.3\u00b0E which put it about 155 miles (250 km) west of Pago Pago, Samoa.\u00a0 Gita was moving toward the east at 18 m.p.h. (29 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 50 m.p.h. (80 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 65 m.p.h. (105 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 989 mb.<\/p>\n
Tropical Cyclone Gita was bringing gusty winds and heavy rain to Samoa.\u00a0 The strongest rainbands were north and east of the center of circulation.\u00a0 The bands south of the center consisted primarily of showers and low clouds.\u00a0 There appeared to be drier air in the southern half of the circulation which was inhibiting the development of taller clouds and stronger storms in that part of Gita.\u00a0 Thunderstorms in the rainbands north of the center of circulation were generating upper level divergence which was pumping mass away to the east of the tropical cyclone.<\/p>\n
Tropical Cyclone Gita will be moving through an environment favorable for intensification.\u00a0 Gita will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperature is near 30\u00b0C.\u00a0 An upper level low south of Gita is producing easterly winds which are blowing toward the top of the circulation.\u00a0 Those winds are causing some vertical wind shear, but the shear does not appear to be strong enough to prevent intensification.\u00a0 The drier air in southern half of the circulation will inhibit intensification.\u00a0 However, if some of the rainbands north of the center wrap around the southern side of the center, then they could reduce the effects of the drier air.\u00a0 Tropical Cyclone Gita is likely to intensify into the equivalent of a hurricane\/typhoon during the weekend.<\/p>\n
The upper low south of Gita is currently steering the tropical cyclone toward the east.\u00a0 Gita will approach the eastern end of the upper low during the next 24 hours and it will move more toward the south.\u00a0 Tropical cyclone Gita will turn back toward the west when it moves south of the upper low.\u00a0 On its anticipated track Tropical Cyclone Gita will continue to bring gusty winds and heavy rain to Samoa for another 12 to 24 hours.\u00a0 Gita could pass near Niue in 24 to 48 hours and it could move near Tonga in about three days.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tropical Cyclone Gita formed near Samoa on Friday.\u00a0 At 10:00 a.m. EST on Friday the center of Tropical Cyclone Gita was located at latitude 14.8\u00b0N and longitude 172.3\u00b0E which put it about 155 miles (250 km) west of Pago Pago, Samoa.\u00a0 Gita was moving toward the east at 18 m.p.h. (29 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[76,2],"tags":[956,89,306,957,301,334,954,307,955,90],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5517"}],"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=5517"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5518,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5517\/revisions\/5518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}