Emily's Offspring to Provide Rain to North Central - North Florida

"Rain-Storm" - July 28, 2014 Near Satellite Beach 

TODAY: Things have changed rapidly (though not unexpectedly) overnight. A surface boundary associated with departing Emily left a surface front across South Central by late yesterday. That boundary has retreated as a 'warm front' north to almost I-10 as of 10AM.   South of the boundary, as can be seen below, Emily's offspring in the form of a 'vorticity max' (more than one) is on the trail toward North Florida today, with another apparently awaiting in it's wings for tomorrow further to the Southwest over the Loop Current. What exactly will occur with that is questionable, but for today...

Cloud cover already beginning to over-spread areas that were earlier thought might see a 'good shot at thunder'  so earlier model runs to be tossed. How pervasive the in-coming high - mid level clouds into parts of Central or even South Central  will determine where, if any where, strong thunder will be realized, if in fact, much at all.

For now based  on watching satellite loops , and based on latest wind-profiler information from around the Space Center along with surrounding Rawinsode Sounding Data out of MIA and MLB will go with increasing cloud cover especially along and north of I4. Chance of thunder there still exists but am hesitant to call for 'stronger storms'. Further south and east the chance might improve depending on how much prolonged insolation is received before 2pm or so.

Steering for rain showers and storms is from the WSW-SW at around 17kts from cloud base on up into the mid levels but not strong enough near 'the deck' to off set the development of the east coast sea breeze from Daytona and South. Thus, rain-thunder storms to move easily from west to east today and straight off the coast. Best guess for now is that the east coast sea breeze will form but remain close to the coast, especially for Brevard / Volusia. Best area of insolation and sea breeze/outflow convergence appears to be the coast of Brevard and Indian River Counties then curving inland a bit toward northern side of Lake Okeechobee, and western half of Martin County. Other storms could form further south from St Lucie County to Palm Beach, Broward and Miami/Dade.  

Hazard mainly would be lightning as usual, and heavy rain. Thankfully the majority of the largest rainfall totals appears to be over areas that were least impacted by Emily the other day, though areas that did receive high totals will still see more rain chances today and tomorrow to add insult to injury. Outside of the pervasive lightning threat, stronger wind gusts could occur in the area in 'red' (only as an example). The area in purple is highlighting where it looks like the highest two day rainfall today will be.

THURSDAY: Again, a somewhat similar situation at hand that will likely evolve in a different way. Drier air is to   advect  around the west side of High pressure building in from the Western Atlantic first to South Florida then up though all of South Central by late in the day. Though there could be 'some rain ' in those areas though not very likely but in isolated cases, the better chances for thunder/rain on Thursday appears will be along a line running from near Palm Bay toward Sarasota and north..with an even better chance along and north of I-4 (generally speaking).

FRIDAY: Looks so far like a 'dry slug' will move in with most rain chances restricted to North Florida.

SATURDAY: Shifting again to respectable thunder /lightning risk in what appears to be a  'typically on the wetter type of 'Summer' type of Day ' regime as the ridge axis continues to lift north from South Florida to Central Florida. 

SUNDAY: Same regime as ridge lifts even further north. Rain chances from here on out going into at least mid week next week go down appreciably many areas. Some consecutive dry days in some areas are thus forthcoming. possibly for nearly a week toward next weekend at the rate it's looking now...with most rain chances restricted to SE Florida in the mornings and the interior and west coast in the latter parts of the day.