Thursday Update on Hanna and Ike

Written by: Brian Neudorff

Right now the two main players in the tropics are Hanna and Ike. (Josephine is out there but doesn't appear to not be any harm to land) Hanna most certainly will and Ike looks like it will make landfall in the United States. Over the last 12 hours Hanna looked less and less like a tropical storm and more like a subtropical storm. You can see this on the satellite image, where the center is more open with all the clouds and rain in a ring around the storm.

As of 11 a.m. Hanna was still a tropical storm with maximum sustain winds of 65 mph. It was moving northwest through the Bahamas at 12 mph. At this time, it will be very difficult for Hanna to reorganize given the current upper level wind conditions. The National Hurricane Center continues to forecast Hanna into a minimum category 1 hurricane (winds of 74 mph or greater) 36 to 48 hours from now. The good news it there is a very good possibility, in my opinion that Hanna will remain a strong tropical storm when it makes landfall in the Carolinas sometime Friday Night into Saturday morning. (Click here for the NHC forecasted path for Hanna)

The other storm is the very strong and impressive Ike. Overnight Ike strengthened into a major hurricane, a category 4, with peak maximum sustained winds of 145 mph. As of 11 a.m. it was still a category 4 hurricane with sustain winds of 140 mph. Ike is a large and dangerous Cape Verdes-type hurricane and the visible satellite loops of Ike show the classic signatures of a major hurricane--a well-formed eye, plenty of spiral bands, and well-established upper-level outflow. Over the last several hour the structure of Ike on satellite shows a "squashed appearance", and appears to be missing a chunk on the northwest side. Ike is expected to weaken some over the next several hours as it deals with wind shear. Keep in mind that Ike has a strong eyewall, and intense hurricanes like Ike can “create their own atmospheres” and thus be more resistant to wind shear.

At this time it is hard to say where or when along the continental U.S. Ike will make landfall. It appears to me that right now Ike could hit any where from the Florida Keys to New England and be a dangerous major hurricane (Category 3 or stronger). It is still possible that Ike will recurve to the north missing the United States completely but given the trend of the models that seems unlikely at this time. takes Ike just north of Hispaniola and into the Bahamas and is expected to be a major hurricane as it gets closer to Florida.