A strong tropical wave is currently located over the central Tropical Atlantic near about 40 West Longitude. This tropical wave is definitely better organized than it was just 12 or 24 hours ago & because of this, I think it is quite likely that it will develop into a tropical system once it enters the Caribbean around Sunday night and Monday. Supporting the idea of likely development is the fact that the environmental conditions across the Caribbean look quite favorable throughout next week.
It should be noted that this strong tropical wave will bring squally weather, including heavy rain & gusty winds, to the Windward Islands during this weekend & particularly on Sunday. This squally weather then looks to persist into Monday across the Windward Islands.
The question then becomes will this system develop in the eastern Caribbean during the first half of next week or wait until it reaches the western Caribbean around late next week. Unfortunately, this is a big uncertainty as the model guidance do not agree on this.
Model guidance such as the Google Deep Mind AI model have trended much stronger with the development & intensity of this system. Because of this, they show a strong tropical system that is picked up by a strong upper level trough moving off of the East Coast of the United States. This turn from a westward heading to a north and northeast heading occurs between 70 West Longitude and 75 West Longitude in the Caribbean around the middle part of next week leading to this system to significantly impact Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands late next week. This same scenario has been forecast by the GFS model for several consecutive runs.
Other model guidance such as the European ensemble guidance show more delayed development leading to this system to make it into the western Caribbean later next week before it begins to really develop. Even with that, there are quite a few members that do show that sharp turn to the northeast next week putting areas including Cuba and the Bahamas at risk.
My Thinking Is That I think that a tropical storm and very probably a hurricane is going to be milling around in the Caribbean next week. The question then becomes which part of the Caribbean will be most threatened & to be honest, I don’t know yet.
My hunch though is that we’ll probably see the development occur in the eastern and central Caribbean during the early parts of next week rather than in the western Caribbean. The reason why I think this is because this tropical wave is currently much more organized than what was previously thought & because of this, it already has a head-start in the development process.
It goes without saying that this system needs to be watched very closely & if you live in the Caribbean or are traveling there, you need to monitor the progress of this system. This includes those of you in the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, the Cayman Islands, Jamaica, the Yucatan Peninsula, Belize & all of Central America.
The next tropical weather discussion will be issued on Saturday.