This is not your typical tropical storm. Danny is a mess. This storm is a blob of displaced convection with an asymmetric surface circulation. The convection has grown northwards overnight suggesting a course of 315 at 10 kts. Really have a difficult time looking at the image below and believing Danny is “getting more organized” as suggested on the tube.  Looking at this morning’s IR image, putting cross hairs on Danny’s center of circulation is problematic to hopeless. The National Hurricane Center (motto: “We work in a concrete bunker!”) has been relying on aircraft recon flights to hunt the center of circulation. These flights and satellite wind images have pegged Danny’s peak winds at 50 kts.  There is just a small patch of 50 kt winds in the northeast quadrant of Danny. Most of the wind observation in and around Danny are 20-30 kts. The displaced winds and asymmetric  character mean Danny is more likely a subtropical storm then text book tropical; but again, this argument should be reserved for an offline  weather weenie slap fight.

Danny is 550 miles southeast of Charleston ( I got nasty letters from the folks in Bucklick…). Despite the difficulty in finding Danny’s center of circulation hour to hour, the models are in excellent agreement with Danny’s recurving track and turn north during the next 48 hours. Even the wayward US NAM and Canadian GEM have got smart and keep Danny at sea. The latest NHC forecast track keeps a 60 kt Danny at least 325 miles east of the beach Friday afternoon. Given the uncertainties in Danny’s actual position, suspect this track may shift further east (that would be the good direction…). Danny will briefly intensify to hurricane strength well off the Virginia Capes before starting a full-fledged transition to an extratropical storm over the weekend as it takes aim at eastern New England. Suspect Danny’s strengthening to hurricane strength and increase in forward speed will be due to Danny’s phasing with the jet stream rather than conventional tropical thermodynamics.

Elsewhere in the North Atlantic, Caribbean, GoMex, tropical storm formation is not expected during the next 48-72 hours; jus the normal progression of uninteresting tropical waves.

The National Hurricane Center’s forecast track for Danny:

Mark Malsick

Severe Weather Liaison

South Carolina Department of Natural Resources

State Climate Office

1000 Assembly Street Columbia, SC 29202

803-734-0039

MalsickM@dnr.sc.gov