Could Be a Great Day for Sky-Pix

(Image: A Sky-Pic of towering cumulus rapidly becoming a storm yesterday looking toward Merritt Island )

RECAP: Events unfolded yesterday pretty much as expected for the earlier portion of the day, although coverage of storms was lower than expected. The main shows in town were completely over N. Merritt Island and down by Vero (for which a 'possible funnel statement' was issued). It was later in the day that events unfolded in a fashion somewhat unforeseen. In other words, there wasn't a solid sea breeze collision between the west and east coast except for in a very ubiquitous fashion near sunset...instead of colliding they met, kissed, and died with the setting sun. Very low theta-E / lapse rates indeed shutdown the region to our north as was feared would occur...and the west coast sea breeze swept completely across that same region as well in short order with no convective results.

SYNOPSIS: High pressure is centered about 100 miles west of the Keys in the Gulf and another center is well out in the Atlantic. An inverted short-wave trough is moving through the Bahamas and approaching the extreme southeast Florida coast around the southern periphery of the Atlantic high. Although models depict these two pressure systems 'joined at the hip' by an axis running directly overhead I do not believe this is the case at all. In actuality, the peninsula lies in a no-man's land between the outer fringes of each of them with very slight surface troughiness that will be running down the spine of the state once daytime heating begins (thermally induced trough). Meanwhile, the latest KSC sounding shows a very moist atmosphere (PWAT of 1.99") with winds of 8 knts or less up to 20,000 ft).

TODAY: Much like yesterday to start...but sooner. The wind is essentially calm all up and down the coast this morning..and took all night and most of the pre-sun rise hours to achieve that status...and sincere land breeze is not evident. Thus, the sea breeze circulation process will not take as long to get its wheels turning later this morning.

TODAY (EARLY): Expect the sea breeze to begin between 10:00am - 11am. The further south toward West Palm the sooner it will be. Watch the sky for large cumulus clouds to form anywhere from extreme southeast Florida north to the port (Canaveral) within the hour of the sea breeze. Like yesterday, there is a very strong area of low 950-700mb Theta-E/lapse rates spread all across the N. Central Florida peninsula of which the Space Center is right on the southern cusp off. Thus, it is highly questionable as to whether they will have a show over the Wildlife Refuge as they did yesterday. Although there is the ever so remote chance of a funnel cloud or even a waterspout over the intercoastal, those chances at this specific time do not look quite as possible today as yesterday...but there is that low end chance...it's just even lower than yesterday.

EARLY-MID AFTERNOON: Activity, outflow, the sea breeze...(the whole kabosh) will drift toward the west and the coast will scour out with some debris cloud remnants lingering in the vicinity of where a shower/storm managed to form. There should be a lull in any activity during the mid afternoon before "West meets East meets Lake Breezes" somewhere along a North/South line running from Lake Okeechobee to just north of Orlando by the latter portion of mid afternoon. Additionally, a mid-level system will scoot across the north central peninsula (like around Ocala-Gainesville) where things will have been quiet..until that system passes over. At that time this region will also be open to convection (storms) which will be moving from west to east.

Storm motion from just north of Orlando to points south will be chaotic and totally contingent upon where outflow boundaries collide and resultant development propagates. Further north there should be a little bit of a definitive eastward push.

AFTER DARK: Activity to the south will quickly wane whereas the activity to the north could persist well into the evening as it pushes toward the east coast from Daytona northward. It's doubtful it will actually reach the immediate coast though when all is said and done.

TOMORROW AND DAYS OUT: In general, the ridge axis at all levels will reside across North Central Florida especially on Friday...but it is noted that there will be periods of widely variant behavior in its actions. I'll be watching just exactly what affect tropical waves or inverted troughs have on the Atlantic High pressure system each and every day...since what happens with the western extent of that system across the peninsula will have a large influence as to where these waves go...what type of moisture we'll have...etc ad naseum. In other words, we will have a number of days ahead with great variability between each and every day. Temperatures will run right at normal area wide.