NHC Deputy Director Jaime Rhone on Tropical Storm Bertha's impacts along the Gulf Coast

[00:00:00]the Gulf, but Louisiana is one of the states that we'll be watching carefully.

[00:00:04]In fact, Fox Weather correspondent Brandy Campbell is in New Orleans. She's going to be joining us later, but we want to kick things off and head to Miami. Uh deputy director of the National Hurricane Center, Jamie Roome, is standing by. Jamie, good morning to you. So, uh we've got a messy storm this morning and it's um it's in the in the Gulf Coast. Let's uh talk about the latest stats.

[00:00:26]Yeah, I mean if you can look behind me here, you can see the satellite imagery shows all of the showers that, you know, the heaviest showers and thunderstorms displaced to the south owing to the northerly uh vertical shear that we've been talking about. This is good news because in addition to keeping sort of the bulk of the heavy rain offshore, it's uh you know, significantly inhibiting any any further development.

[00:00:54]And as we continue to look, Jamie, as we continue to look at the track going forward, what do folks in this area need to be prepared for?

[00:01:02]>> You know, I mean, it's it's basically a wind and a and a storm surge event this at this point because the rain is offshore. Um, you can see here the colored areas uh behind me, similar to graphics that you've been showing all morning sort of denote the areas um that could get the the wind impacts. The the yellow is a tropical storm watch, the blue a tropical storm warning. Uh we're looking at, you know, lowend tropical storm force winds as the center makes its closest point approach over the next day or so. Um and then a little bit of storm surge here uh in in southeast Louisiana to the tune of 2 to four feet.

[00:01:38]Um so not a a huge deal, but certainly if you're in some of these more vulnerable areas along the immediate coastline, uh you're definitely going to feel the impacts. Wondering too, Jamie, when we when we look at this this system because it is it is um struggling to to organize. It is something that we would expect in in the month of July. July can really bring these uh these messy types of storms. Would you say from a forecasting perspective, does it make it easier or or tougher?

[00:02:05]>> Yeah, it's also very typical of an El Nino. I mean, to your point, uh very typical of a early season storm, but also very typical of an El Nino type year. It doesn't necessarily make it more challenging, although the the motion has been sort of erratic. If you've been following along, the center has sort of formed and dissipated and formed, dissipated, and that's what creates that uh sort of jumpiness in the track. But the forecast itself has been relatively stable over the course of time. You know, just to to give you a little color commentary, um you usually a slowmoving storm like this, and you guys know this really well. um you know, you would be screaming from the rooftops the heavy rain potential, right? The heavy rain potential. So, in this case, because the the satellite imagery, you know, the storm the shear is pushing all of the rain to the south. Um we think the heaviest rain is going to stay offshore. To me, that is a real testament in the advancement of forecasting, the ability to isolate that that hazard is going to stay offshore.

[00:03:08]>> Right. The forecast just continued to improve. And going along those lines over the weekend, the Euro AI model really had a good grip initially uh taking this off to the west while GFS looks like it was taking more of a northerly tract. Has anything surprised you about what these forecast models have spit out or is there any one model that you're thinking, hey, this is better than the others?

[00:03:29]Not really because our forecasters have [snorts] um in addition to to the the models that you're referencing, they have many many more and they have these uh AI techniques that uh look at the past performance of those models and and almost correct them if you will that the the there that our in-house processing sort of knows how those models behave and perform in past events and and present our forecasters with a more curated, if you will, uh look at those particular models. So, you know, none of the models jumped out at us as, you know, performing better or worse than the others. It's it's a relatively straightforward forecast so far.

[00:04:09]>> Yeah. And it's uh and it's been remarkable to watch. I I remember from a a timing, you know, these these nearshore storms, they can sometimes throw curveballs. And it was last Wednesday that you guys at the NHC issued a tropical weather outlook, slight chance, and things evolved rather quickly. It was Saturday and Sunday that we suddenly saw the designation of an invest and then and then suddenly we had a tropical depression and now we've got tropical storm Bertha. I I I think when we look at the forecast and if you've got Texans watching, a lot of them looking at that cone, obviously uncertainty grows as as we head throughout the forecast. the cone right now encompasses Dallas, Houston, all the way close to, you know, Corpus Christie.

[00:04:51]There's a lot of uncertainty there. Um h how would you communicate what to expect for for people living in Texas? Cuz with what you've been showing us, bulk of the activity is well south of that core.

[00:05:02]Things are going to be, we hope, mostly dry as this thing gets a little closer and even weekends toward Texas.

[00:05:08]>> Yeah, this is a really good point, a really good question. you know, a lot there was a lot of concern initially in in Texas, rightfully so, because there' been a fair bit of of flooding in advance of this the developments of Bertha. And what we think is going to happen here is it's going to be weakening significantly before it even makes it to Texas. I mean, it may not even be a system uh by the time it gets into Texas. So, the impacts to Texas at this point look relatively small. I mean, maybe some residual moisture moves into Texas, but we're not looking at a big impact at this time. The cone sort of shows it on here, but I mean, if you look really close, it's denoting a tropical depression, you know, weakening back to a depression. And and I'll be honest, I'm not even sure if it hangs on to that uh as it gets to the latter part of this column.

[00:05:59]>> Yeah, it's it it's really going to to to look like a weak system. I mean, that's what all signs point to, but but it it bears watching. Before we let we go, we let you go. Um, one quick question. I know Melanie had talked about the storm storm surge, and you hit on it. From a timing perspective, when could it be worse for the central Gulf Coast? I mean, we're looking even in Appalachiccola this morning. There has been a bit of a a water rise. Are we looking at just the next 24 maybe 36 hours?

[00:06:26]>> Yeah, it's really the next couple of high tides. to the high tide later today and and then the high tide tomorrow. Uh this amount of storm surge two to four feet we think uh you know talking to to local officials you know it it'll be relatively okay. Certainly can cut off some roads and flood some roads and cause some inconveniences but at this stage not looking at a big evacuation type situation. So as long as the forecast holds um you know I think we're going to do okay in this particular event.

[00:06:52]>> All right. Well we'll be watching it. We know the hurricane hunters too continue to fly into the storm. So all that vital data will be getting and uh we look forward to the advisories ahead. Thank you for joining us this morning. Jamie Rome, deputy director for the National Hurricane Center.