Tropical Cyclone Mekunu passed by Socotra Island on Wednesday.\u00a0 At 11:00 p.m. EDT on Wednesday the center of Tropical Cyclone Mekunu was located at latitude 13.3\u00b0N and longitude 55.5\u00b0E which put it about 285 miles (460 km) south-southeast of Salalah, Oman.\u00a0 Mekunu was moving toward the north-northwest at 6 m.p.h. (10 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 90 m.p.h. (145 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 115 m.p.h. (185 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 970 mb.<\/p>\n
The inner core of Tropical Cyclone Mekunu passed east of Socotra Island on Wednesday.\u00a0 However, several strong rainbands in the western half of the tropical cyclone did pass over the island.\u00a0 Those bands dropped locally heavy rain and they may have produced winds to tropical storm force,\u00a0 Rain was still falling over parts of the island and the potential for flooding continued.<\/p>\n
Tropical Cyclone Mekunu intensified quickly into the equivalent of a hurricane\/typhoon on Wednesday.\u00a0 An eye formed at the center of circulation.\u00a0 A nearly complete ring of thunderstorms surrounded the eye and the strongest winds were occurring in that ring of storms.\u00a0 The northeastern part of the ring was the weakest section of the eyewall.\u00a0 Several bands of showers and thunderstorms were revolving around the core of Tropical Cyclone Mekunu.\u00a0 The strongest rainbands were south and west of the center of circulation,\u00a0 Bands northeast of the center consisted primarily of low clouds and showers.\u00a0 Thunderstorms near the core of Mekunu were generating strong upper level divergence which was pumping mass away from the tropical cyclone.<\/p>\n
Winds to hurricane\/typhoon force extended out about 60 miles (95 km) from the center of circulation.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extended out about 230 miles (370 km) from the center.\u00a0 The Hurricane Intensity Index (HII) for Tropical Cyclone Mekunu was 13.9.\u00a0 The Hurricane Size Index (HSI) was 21.9.\u00a0 The Hurricane Wind Intensity Size Index (HWISI) was 35.8.<\/p>\n
Tropical Cyclone Mekunu will move through an environment favorable for intensification during the next 24 to 36 hours.\u00a0 Mekunu will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperature is near 30\u00b0C.\u00a0 It will move near the western end of an upper level ridge.\u00a0 The ridge will produce weak southerly winds which will blow toward the top of the circulation.\u00a0 Those winds will cause some vertical wind shear, but the shear will not be strong enough to prevent further intensification.\u00a0 Tropical Cyclone Makunu could strengthen into the equivalent of a major hurricane.<\/p>\n
The upper level ridge steered Tropical Cyclone Mekunu toward the north-northwest on Wednesday and that general motion is expected to continue for several more days.\u00a0\u00a0 On its anticipated track Tropical Cyclone Mekunu could approach the coast of western Oman and eastern Yemen within 48 hours.\u00a0 Mekunu will bring strong winds and locally heavy rain when it reaches the coast.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Tropical Cyclone Mekunu passed by Socotra Island on Wednesday.\u00a0 At 11:00 p.m. EDT on Wednesday the center of Tropical Cyclone Mekunu was located at latitude 13.3\u00b0N and longitude 55.5\u00b0E which put it about 285 miles (460 km) south-southeast of Salalah, Oman.\u00a0 Mekunu was moving toward the north-northwest at 6 m.p.h. (10 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":[48,2],"tags":[1009,57,689,54,260,1010,256,1011,255],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5886"}],"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=5886"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5886\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5887,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5886\/revisions\/5887"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5886"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5886"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5886"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}