Tropics Update: Development Possible In The Caribbean And Gulf! Who Will Get Impacts?

Added: 2026-05-27

[00:00:05][music] >> What is up, weather enthusiasts? I'm your host, Hats Path Predictor. Let's get right into the weather.

[00:00:20]All right, so here's the situation we have for you, ladies and gentlemen. We have some more models, and we have some more updates to go over with this potential area of interest. Well, I not necessarily NHC area of interest, but rather my area of interest, rather a lot of people on Twitter's area of interest with this potential tropical development that might be happening. So, we're going to be talking about that. We're also going to be going over some other models as well to see, okay, how what's the rest of the week, and what's the what's next week going to start potentially looking like as well. So, with that being said, we're going to go ahead and dive right into it right here.

[00:00:58]So, starting off, we have our GFS for you guys right here, rather the ensemble data. We'll start with the European, and then we'll get to the GFS. So, this is what we got starting right here. As you can see as you can see, we have the European ensembles pulled up. This is for 6 days out, so this will be for next Monday right here. This is So, 144 hours out. So, this is what we got going on right here. So, starting out, we do have this little bit of ensembles right here off the coast of Central America and Mexico as well.

[00:01:34]Taking a quick gander at that, mainly remaining very close to to shore right there. Kind of looks appearing, at least according to the European, that they're developing off maybe the the Central American gyre as well. So, go go ahead and fast forward a little bit a couple days, so we'll go to 192 hours out, so that will be on for June 3rd.

[00:01:55]By June 3rd, you're definitely looking at some stuff potentially develop potentially developing at least some ensembles calling for it, but they are still relatively scattered at this current point and there's not very much of a signal at this current point in time. It's mainly the impacts for Florida, Cuba, and the Bahamas that I'm paying attention to. It looks like the European has backed off on that potential area as well. May The GFS is still going forward, but the GFS has its own problems that we'll go ahead and get into in just a few minutes.

[00:02:27]But as we continue to go on, let's go ahead and go to the next day. So, this is June 4th. Looking at this right here, you're looking at some potential tropical development. You're looking at some more organization, at least according to the European, as as a potential Gulf system might be entering at that current point time.

[00:02:44]Keep in mind, this is first of all, this is this is late May, early June, and it's also 9 days out. So, do you have to take some of this with a massive grain of sodium chloride as well. And then you have pretty much by 10 days out, which would be June which would be I believe June 5th, yes.

[00:03:04]You do have some ensembles showing some sort of tropical or low pressure activity going on the eastern Gulf and in parts of the southeastern United States as well. So, that's definitely something to pay attention to right here. As for these ensembles right here, I don't know if they're tropical development or if it's more of a mid-latitude cold core system as well cuz I know some of these models typically tend to have a little don't necessarily just kind of differentiate those the best. So, that's just something you need to take into consideration and something that I've been kind of skeptical on for the last few days.

[00:03:45]Pulling up the GFS, the GFS is telling a completely different story because of course it is and we'll go ahead and go to June 1st. Actually, we'll go ahead and go to a couple days earlier than that, so that will be on the 30th of May. As you're looking at this, you're looking at two distinct areas of potential development, I would say. You have this area right here in parts off the coast of Florida, Georgia, and the Carolinas right here. This right here, I am not too fond on it. I'm not kind of necessarily being sold too much on. The reason I'm not is because this looks to me like it's at least from where it's originating, it's less of a tropical area development and more of a a cold core system. So basically, what I mean by that is a warm core system is a tropical cyclone, but a cold core system is a mid-latitude cyclone. Cold core systems have their own fronts attached to it. They use barrel clinic forcing to intensify. Warm core relies solely on the water temperatures of the ocean to develop. So I hope that kind of clears that up pretty discreetly, and then we'll go ahead and go to the next day. So this will be May 31st. You're having the GFS really showing a lot of ensembles of low pressure over here and tropical development over here that still might be hitting Cuba, Florida, and the Bahamas, but there are some problems with the GFS that I'll be getting into in just a second. But as we go ahead and go to 3 days later as the system really starts to kind of move out to sea right here. It kind of moves through and then starts weakening, and you do see some strengthening at least in this part of the ocean right here. But again, I am a bit skeptical of that. I'm thinking a lot of this is because of barrel clinic forcing and more of a cold core setup instead of a warm core setup as well. So that's definitely something that I'm still paying attention to.

[00:05:43]So shifting over to we're going going the scene over a little bit to our operational runs, as well. So, let's go ahead and pull them up uh at least according to the European and the GFS and a few others that will also kind of cross-reference, as well. Here's what we have for the uh European model. European kind of doesn't show too much happening.

[00:06:02]Although, if you are in Florida, if you are in the southeastern US, you're definitely going to give you getting some impact. You're definitely going to be getting some uh pretty big rain from all of this. The question is, is it going to be tropical in nature? Are the impacts going be worse? Or is it generally going to be more bareoclinic forcing or is in more of a mid-latitude cyclone that moves through? Or is it even meso-scale?

[00:06:23]Uh which is pretty much a smaller scale uh as well. So, definitely looking at the impacts there for sure. You're definitely getting some uh pretty good convection over there. But, if we go ahead and go ahead and go to about 6 days out, so this will be for June 1st, you do notice a bit of a low-pressure system kind of getting blipped up over here according to the European. That does match up with some of the ensembles they were showing earlier. Question is, where does this low-pressure system end up going? And does it really do too much? It looks like according to the European, it doesn't do terribly much.

[00:06:56]You might see maybe a little bit of something happening in parts of the Gulf right here. It's a very disorganized mass right here, but it definitely does cross-check with what uh the European has been kind of forecasting on the ensemble. So, definitely we are starting to see something, but because it's 9 and a half days out and because it's late May and early June by the time this is going on, it's very very uh kind of it's I'm not I wouldn't necessarily say I'm not convinced, but it's kind of a little bit up in the air at this current point.

[00:07:29]Based on everything that's going on, as well as the context of the timing. If this was like August or September, I definitely would be a lot more concerned about this, but because it's so early in the season, it's something that I'm not necessarily too worried about, although it does end up organizing and it does end up getting through parts of the of the Carolinas right here by by 10 days out according to this. So, definitely something to watch out for and I'm going to go ahead and cross-check this with the GFS as well.

[00:08:00]Cross-checking this with the GFS uh taking a quick gander at this let's take a look. So, GFS still is favoring that area of tropical development, but there are some problems with it that I do want to go over uh very quickly. First problem I have is let's go ahead and check the vorticity. Let's check the 700 millibar vorticity. That's a little bit higher in the atmosphere. Where is this vorticity coming from? Well, as we kind of noticed last year with the GFS, it had a very hard big problem differentiating vorticity from this.

[00:08:34]What is this, Patrick? This is smoke from the wildfires that are currently going on in parts of Venezuela and Colombia. This is uh what the models are doing is they're picking this up as their own realms of vorticity and causing a lot of errors with them, I would say. And the reason I mention say errors is because what this is end up doing is bringing the vorticity over here and then you eventually down the line it flares up a big area of tropical development according to the GFS and it just kind of runs with it at that point.

[00:09:06]That's not necessarily how weather works, obviously. Um but I will I've also noticing too that there is some more vorticity kind of getting uh flared up over here in parts of Central America as well. So, ultimately, I talked about this in yesterday's video, but it appears to me that there is a combination of both a legitimate signal and some other aspects of it that do not make any sense at all.

[00:09:32]So, for example, this area right here to the west off the coast of Belize and uh Honduras. That to me looks a bit more legitimate, whereas this over here, uh which has kind of emerged off the the wildfire smoke makes makes absolutely no sense whatsoever for it to ultimately become the main area of vorticity and to pop a tropical cyclone out of it. We saw these problems last year. We're seeing some these problems again this year, although they're not as bad as they were previously. And also the uh taking speaking of uh cyclones, looking at the GFS uh right here. This is kind of their other area that they were highlighting as well. The question is is is this more cold core or is this tropical or subtropical? I'm leaning towards this being cold core, although a subtropical cyclone is not out of the question right here. So, that's kind of something to pay attention to and to keep in mind.

[00:10:25]And based on the way it's acting, yeah, it to me appears more frontal than it does tropical right here. So, that's definitely something to keep in mind. As for this low-pressure system, I'm not necessarily trusting it. You do have a much broader low-pressure system that starts to move through the area that comes from uh that part of the Caribbean. It's a lot broader and it's not necessarily um it's not necessarily the uh um like the worst situation ever, I would say.

[00:10:52]It's definitely bringing quite a few impacts to Florida, Cuba, and the Bahamas, but it's very broad and I wouldn't necessarily uh be too concerned of tropical development unless something unexpectedly happens here, which given the time of year, that usually doesn't happen. So, what's and as a matter of fact, I just want to be out of my own curiosity, I want to see what the shear is looking like. We are kind of going a little bit uh normally we look at the models and we go over the conditions and all of that. I just for my curiosity, I want to look at the shear and the dry air just for this instance and then we can move on to the next part of this video. So, let's go ahead and take a quick gander at the wind shear.

[00:11:30]Wind shear at least starting around May 30th, we can go ahead. When shear is not particularly that good, but it's also not particularly that bad for tropical development either. You're looking at around 30 knots of wind shear on average, although I'd say the average is kind of dipped down to about 20 to 25 as of late. That's definitely more doable for tropical development. The problem is is how can how will that sustain? Will it be get stronger or will it even weaken a little bit? So, that's what we're questioning and that's what we're looking at uh right here. Taking a quick gander this. It does strengthen by June 1st a little bit. And then as we get to the 2nd and then to the 3rd, you do see a bit of a break of wind shear as you're kind of seeing more of a of a ridge pattern starting to build up over here and then move towards the move towards um the uh Gulf region as well before more shear starts to intrude. So, ultimately, your wind shear still is going to be a bit of a wild card, I would argue.

[00:12:31]Taking a quick look at the moisture component as well. Moisture component isn't as bad either. It's not necessarily as big of a wild card as the as the as the wind shear is, but dry air is still a little bit present right here. Although, according to previous forecast, it definitely is a bit more mixed out and it's definitely a lot less in this part of the Gulf than it was in the last couple of days. Whether you see it see it as good news or not, that's up to you. But, at least in terms of tropical development, there definitely is more moisture to work with in the foreseeable future. But, that's kind of definite that's kind of been a given at this current point. Water temperatures, OHC, and moisture are definitely favorable for this kind of development, but it's ultimately the wind shear that's more so the wild card and the thing that would probably stop this from getting too out of control compared especially compared to what we might be seeing in August and September for every hurricane season typically.

[00:13:27]But, that's I just rest my case with that at this current point. So, that's what we're looking at with your moisture components all this. Now, what we're going to end up doing is we're going to go ahead and zoom out uh to the North Atlantic, and we're going to be looking at conditions. What we're going to be looking at is, "Okay, now that that's go uh that's the we've talked about what's going on in the Caribbean. We've seen all that.

[00:13:50]What are we looking at Atlantic-wide, and what are there what are some things that we need to look out for especially going in the next couple of weeks? So, let's go ahead and start with your water temperatures. Water temperatures pretty good.

[00:14:02]At least in much of the Western Atlantic and parts of the main development region and in parts of the Eastern Atlantic as well, they're not particularly that warm. They need to those temperatures are going to need to rise and eventually catch up to what's going on uh to the west, but ultimately your water temperatures at least in the Western is averaging I'd say about 27° so 27 28° C, which is about 81 to 82° F for those of you who do not use the metric system, i.e., those who live in the US, Puerto Rico, and her territories. So, that's what we're averaging over here in this part of the Atlantic over here.

[00:14:41]We're looking at a lot colder of a scenario right here averaging around 25 to 26, so that's 77 to 78° F for those living in the United States. That's not typically your favorable for tropical development at least initially. You could definitely see maybe a tropical storm come out of this I at the very most, but that's not what you're typically looking for and at least compared to what we saw in 2023, 2024, and 2025, that's a bit of a dip compared to what we've seen on previous years. So, that's your water temperatures. Looking at your ocean heat content, OHC is still definitely very much there.

[00:15:19]OHC at at in parts of the Western Atlantic right here. Definitely starting to get a little bit larger in some of these are areas in the Caribbean.

[00:15:27]Definitely starting to spread out a bit more in the Caribbean in general. Also looking at the Gulf Stream, looking at about not the Gulf Stream, but the loop currents.

[00:15:36]Looking at about 75 to 100 OHC on that as well. So definitely starting to see something. Keep in mind, this is late May of the the hurricane season. We're not going to be seeing the very explosive uh OHC values like we did in 2024 and even 2025 until late July and early August at the late at the earliest.

[00:15:59]Although I typically in July is when the waters and the OHC really start to surge. Late June to through July is when that happens. So we'll definitely have to keep an eye on that going forward. In matter of fact, let's go ahead and show you the Climate Reanalyzer uh very quickly. Climate Reanalyzer has been definitely very interesting. It's been a very powerful tool to use for sure. It's actually close to what we were seeing at this point in the hurricane season for 2025. It's not It's not really anywhere close to 2023 or 2024 levels, but 2026 is definitely closer 2025 for sure. It's definitely been on that pace.

[00:16:39]Will that continue? We're not 100% sure.

[00:16:42]We'll see how this ultimately pans out.

[00:16:44]But taking a quick gander at the map as well, I want to see the anomaly as well.

[00:16:49]Those anomalies definitely are pretty interesting. At least in the main development region, definitely colder than average, about neutral as well.

[00:16:56]Whereas in the subtropical Atlantic and the western Atlantic, much warmer than average. So definitely a bit of a kind of a game of catch-up that some of these areas need to have for things to start start cooking, especially later in the hurricane season. Let's go ahead and take a quick gander at your shear brought to you by the European model.

[00:17:18]So, let's go ahead and pull this up uh right here. Here's your wind shear. Mainly, what I'm looking at is, okay, what are the patterns going to be like uh going forward and what are we going to be watching out for for the next couple of weeks? The wild card is always going to be in the in this part of the Atlantic in the western Atlantic where the shear goes up and down, up and down.

[00:17:38]But, from the eastern Caribbean all the way through the main development region remains more stable and a lot stronger.

[00:17:44]And the trade winds because of the El Niño are definitely going to be stronger as well. So, it's going to take a lot more for that kind of shear to get uh kind uh get us moved out and for things to start ramping up over there. So, this is about 6 days out. You're definitely seeing more like a more of a fractured pattern over here, but main development region remains pretty strong over here going to about um a about 3 days later. So, this will be June 3rd. Kind of you're starting to see that shear starting to recover a little bit more.

[00:18:14]And then start to uh build back up.

[00:18:16]You're not necessarily seeing any breaks. You are seeing a few waves and a little bit of the of bending uh with this wind shear, but it's not necessarily breaking from what I have noticed. And then you start seeing the shear coming back by June 7th across parts of the western Caribbean and the Gulf region, but it looks like the Gulf region is going to be your wild card for this year. Mainly because it usually is mainly because there's a bunch of troughs, a bunch of ridges that move through, especially during severe weather season, which that's going to be continuing through late June and early July as well in the United States so that kind of has an an impact on tropical development. What's our moisture component to all of this? Dry air is pretty present across parts of the main development region, mainly because of the Sahara air. That's going to start uh really ramping up uh throughout much of June and by July, we're looking at kind of uh that peak uh as it typically shows. And then you start uh ramping up. But, I am kind of curious right here. There is a bit lower of a high pressure system your kind of your Bermuda high is quite a bit further to the south than you would typically see. Normally you'd see the Azores high just kind of building up and moving through over here in this region not so much in early June. You're seeing more of a Bermuda high set up at least temporarily before the Azores high kicks it into gear. But one thing I do find intriguing is where this dust is kind of getting kicked up to instead of maybe moving further to the west it's kind of getting towards Europe and moving through the subtropical Atlantic as well. So definitely something interesting to watch out for and it looks to me the dry air is definitely something to to watch for sure. But we're going to close this video out right here. With that being said, have a wonderful day guys.

[00:20:02]Stay safe.