Weather model predicts storm next week
Published 1:14 am Friday, June 8, 2018
Don’t buy extra milk and bread yet, but the Global Forecast System (GFS) says there could be another storm in the Gulf this time next week.
The model, which identified the storm potential and track of Alberto, think s a tropical storm could hit the Florida Panhandle on or around June 15.
Today is officially the eighth day of the 2018 hurricane season.
If the prediction is correct, Tropical Storm Beryl will develop in the southern Gulf of Mexico by the middle of next week and move toward the panhandle.
The Global Forecast System (GFS) is a global numerical weather prediction system containing a global computer model and variational analysis run by the United States’ National Weather Service (NWS).
The Canadian model is also onboard with a low coming out of the Yucatan. The European ECMWF does not show any closed low but does bring in a tropical wave into the western Gulf next week.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NOAA, is forecasting a 75 percent chance that the 2018 season will be near normal or above normal. An average hurricane season produces 12 named storms, of which six become hurricanes, including three major hurricanes.
The three big hurricanes of 2017 – Harvey, Irma and Maria – are now three of the five costliest hurricanes in U.S. history, according to NOAA. The storms brought death and destruction to Texas, Florida, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.