Tropical Cyclone Gita strengthened on Saturday as it passed just to the east of Niue.\u00a0 Outer rainbands on the western side of Gita were bringing gusty winds and heavy rain to Niue.\u00a0 At 4:00 p.m. EST on Saturday the center of Tropical Cyclone Gita was located at latitude 19.2\u00b0S and longitude 168.8\u00b0W which put it about 85 miles (135 km) east-southeast of Niue.\u00a0 Gita was moving toward the south at 8 m.p.h. (13 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 85 m.p.h. (135 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 105 m.p.h. (165 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 969 mb.\u00a0 Tropical Cyclone Gita was the equivalent of a hurricane\/typhoon.<\/p>\n
The circulation of Tropical Cyclone Gita became more symmetrical on Saturday.\u00a0 Several rainbands wrapped completely around the center of circulation.\u00a0 A clear area appeared at the center of circulation on visible satellite images, which indicated that an eye was forming.\u00a0 A ring of strong thunderstorms surrounded the eye and the strongest winds were occurring in the ring.\u00a0 Storms in the core of the circulation were generating upper level divergence which was pumping mass away from the tropical cyclone.\u00a0 Other rainbands were revolving around the core of Tropical Cyclone Gita.<\/p>\n
Tropical Cyclone Gita will move through an area favorable for intensification during the next 24 to 48 hours.\u00a0 Gita will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperature is near 30\u00b0C.\u00a0 Tropical Cyclone Gita is moving around the eastern end of an upper level low, but the upper level winds are weak and there is not much vertical wind shear.\u00a0 There is drier air to the southwest of Gita, but it does not seem to be entering the circulation of the tropical cyclone.\u00a0 Tropical Cyclone Gita will continue to intensify and it could strengthen rapidly.\u00a0 Gita could strengthen into the equivalent of a major hurricane.<\/p>\n
The upper level low is steering Tropical Cyclone Gita toward the south.\u00a0 Gita will turn toward the southeast in about 12 to 24 hours.\u00a0 When Gita reaches the southern side of the upper low, it will move toward the west.\u00a0 On its anticipated track Tropical Cyclone Gita will pass just to the southeast of Niue.\u00a0 Gita could approach Tonga in about 36 hours and it could the equivalent of a major hurricane at that time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tropical Cyclone Gita strengthened on Saturday as it passed just to the east of Niue.\u00a0 Outer rainbands on the western side of Gita were bringing gusty winds and heavy rain to Niue.\u00a0 At 4:00 p.m. EST on Saturday the center of Tropical Cyclone Gita was located at latitude 19.2\u00b0S and longitude 168.8\u00b0W which put it […]<\/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":[956,88,92,306,301,334,954,307,955,90],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5524"}],"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=5524"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5524\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5525,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5524\/revisions\/5525"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}