I’m slightly worried. We have a vacation in Orlando scheduled for this coming Thursday through the next Tuesday, Sept. 1 through Sept. 7. I’m looking at some predictions that Hurricane Earl is going to be zooming the east coast Thursday or Friday, possibly staying offshore until around Cape Cod, possibly coming in far enough to hit Baltimore with at least the edges.
This is kind of a nightmare scenario, because five years ago this coming weekend we were scheduled to go to New Orleans, and we all know what happened the week before.
So is anyone who knows their meteorology stuff able to possibly talk me down on the likelihood of our flight Thursday morning getting cancelled because of Earl? Thanks!
Right now, Earl is not scheduled to make landfall in the continental United States. This could change, but current weather reports show a mostly cloudy day on Thursday, with only a 10% chance of rain. Enjoy your flight.
Meteorologist here…I think right now, you are possibly OK. According to the current NHC forecast, http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/ (surf down to the Hurricane Earl products), the storm is forecast to be located about halfway between Cape Hatteras and Bermuda at 2pm local, Thursday.
Points in your favor:
Even though the average forecast “error” is around 200nm for day 4 (Thursday), we can typically predict these situations pretty well. Meaning, in recurvature situations, the main players are the strength of the mid-Atlantic high pressure ridge, and the mid-latitude westerlies belt moving through the U.S.
The western half of the storm, especially non-slow moving storms such as this, is typically much weaker, meaning the gale (39mph) wind radius west of the storm will be lower than the eastern half. Combined with land effects (increased friction), it will be difficult to get anywhere close to the conditions needed to close BWI, I think. Assuming the track doesn’t change. NHC is forecasting a 10% chance (from one of their graphics) that BWI will experience tropical storm (gale) winds or higher.
Points not in your favor:
In recurvature situations such as this, it is not uncommon to have storms move faster than forecast. However, NHC seems to be well-aware of this according to their forecast discussion, and their present forecast is actually faster than most of the numerical models are currently indicating.
So, obviously, keep up-to-date on later forecasts, but right now it appears like it may not be a problem. The storm would need to move faster (very possible), and track farther west (right now it seems unlikely the storm would track the fairly large distance needed to affect BWI. But again, something to watch closely.) for it to pose a problem. That said, who knows if they may shut down the airport as a precaution. But it seems the morning should be OK for now.
Looks like the storm is about 6 hours slower, though the track is a bit farther west. So, I currently do not see any problems flying out of BWI Thursday morning.