Franklin makes 6!

Oy, looks like while I was busy grilling up dinner this evening TS Franklin sprouted out of that tropical wave that came off Africa last week. The forecast doesn’t show it getting much stronger than a tropical storm and making parts of Bermuda wet. These short curvy tracks are always worrisome though because it usually means the storm is caught up in some system that makes it’s track unpredictable.

From today’s 5PM discussion:

THE GLOBAL MODELS TAKE THE SURFACE TO 850 MB CIRCULATION NORTHWARD
AND THEN RECURVE IT NORTHEASTWARD THROUGH THE SUBTROPICAL RIDGE. HOWEVER…ALL OF THE MODELS GENERALLY AGREE THAT THE MID-LEVEL/500 MB CIRCULATION WILL MOVE INTO THE RIDGE AXIS AND STALL IN ABOUT 48 HOURS AS A SHORTWAVE TROUGH MOVES NORTHEAST OF THE DEPRESSION AND ALLOWS THE RIDGE TO BUILD BACK IN TO THE WEST. AFTER THAT…SOME OF THE MODELS MEANDER THE SYSTEM SLOWLY EAST OR SOUTHWARD…WHILE THE GFS AND GFDL MODELS TAKE THE MID-LEVEL CIRCULATION SOUTHWESTWARD TOWARD FLORIDA. THE MEDIUM AND DEEP BAM MODELS ACTUALLY TAKE THE DEPRESSION SLOWLY WESTWARD AFTER 48 HOURS ACROSS CENTRAL FLORIDA. GIVEN THE LARGE SPREAD IN THE MODEL GUIDANCE…WHICH TYPICALLY SUGGESTS SLOW MOTION…THE FORECAST TRACK SHOWS A GRADUAL TURN TO THE NORTH AFTER 24 HOURS AND THEN TURNS THE CYCLONE SLOWLY EASTWARD AND MAKING A SMALL CLOCKWISE LOOP WELL EAST OF THE CENTRAL FLORIDA COAST.