Latest on Tropical Storm Bertha as it is stationary in the Gulf

[00:00:00]Chris Franklin [music] talking about tropical storm Bertha right now.

[00:00:04]>> Yeah, and the impact still appear to be minimal for us. Now, what we know at the moment is that the dry air wind shear.

[00:00:11]When you look at our colorized infrared satellite, most of the storms again remain south of the center. And over time, these should become even more removed to the south. So, we've got the dry air wind shear keeping the northern side of the storm very exposed. Even the eastern side of the storm is fairly exposed as well. Winds remain at 40.

[00:00:30]Pressure has come down, meaning it's trying to strengthen. But that wind shear is certainly going to be a struggle. And the motion stationary, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. A lot of folks keep saying, "Well, the more of the time that it sits over water, the better the opportunity to strengthen." Not always the case if the upper atmosphere is hostile, which it is. Why that's a good thing. At the moment, the storm is not moving anywhere. And even earlier in the day, that forward motion west northwest or so at 3 mph was barely any kind of a forward motion. What we don't want to see is that this drift farther north before making its way to the west because the farther north it gets by the time it starts moving west, that places it more over southeast Louisiana. So, because it is not going anywhere right now, and the forward motion may not really pick up until possibly later tomorrow night or more into Wednesday, the hurricane center shifted the track and is placing it more along the southern Louisiana coast. Again, you kind of keep in mind that this is the entirety of where the storm could be. And the center line is not exact, but I like using the center line because it does show a trend. Which had been more over south Louisiana, is now down along the coastline. So, that is again not a bad thing because it places the center of the storm and the heaviest rain even farther off of the Louisiana coastline. Where the storm is right now, Bertha is kind of in between systems with a big upper-level low sitting on top, so it doesn't really have anywhere to go until this upper high starts strengthening. What the upper high is going to start doing is first kind of picking it up and moving to the west.

[00:02:12]And what it's also going to help to do is start pushing it, the center of the storm, as well as the thunderstorm development, away from the center, kind of helping to rip it apart.

[00:02:22]That's why we don't want it to move any farther north because by the time it does start moving west, it has a better opportunity of moving more over southeast Louisiana. Hugging the coast and keeping the bigger storms offshore would be ideal for us. Very dry air, strong wind shear will remain in place through the uh history of the storm. So, where those storms are right around the center of Bertha at the moment, or at least on the southern side, they will start to get displaced even farther south as the storm center gets closer to us. Not to say we won't see any rainfall, but it does take the bulk of it away. And where we would see the 10 to 15 in uh s off in the open waters of the Gulf, not an issue for us. Now, our model here showing the Hurricane Center's forecast, as well as the uh Precision Cast model, not exact, but it does have a good picture of what the storms could look like as it moves toward us. Everything staying offshore.

[00:03:19]Again, does not mean we don't see any rainfall, but at least what would produce 10 to 15 plus inches would all stay south. So, the rainfall totals locally by Wednesday, Thursday, we'll get some passing showers even tomorrow, are all manageable amounts. Now, we are going to see the winds pick up.

[00:03:37]Although, you look at all the buoys kind of around the center of the storm, they're struggling to even find wind support of a 40 mph, and I don't think the 40 mph winds are going to be near the center. They, too, will be displaced a little bit more to the south where most of the thunderstorm development is.

[00:03:51]So, while we will have a windier day during the day on Wednesday, they're going to be far less around the region than they would otherwise be had the center of the storm been a little bit more organized. That thankfully is not going to be the case. Storm surge totals also in manageable range. We are going to see some minor coastal flooding outside of the hurricane risk reduction system, but even those totals are on the lower side. Something that we typically see sometimes when you just have a strong east wind. We see tides running 1 to 2 ft above ground level. So, that'll be what we watch for coastal flooding.

[00:04:25]And as far as rainfall goes, I think that should be manageable. We'll keep an eye out for Wednesday, Thursday. We'll have some passing showers tomorrow. And then by Friday and on to the weekend, the heat returns and we stay mostly dry.