Hurricane Beryl makes its final landfall in Texas

After a 13-day journey from the west coast of Africa to the Gulf coast of Texas, Beryl made its final landfall early Monday morning near Matagorda, Texas as a Category 1 hurricane.  It was on a strengthening trend leading up to landfall, so thankfully it ran out of time before it could regain too much of its former intensity.

However, it is producing significant storm surge and flash flooding on Monday in Texas... this radar loop shows the few hours before and after landfall.  The full collection of land-based radar coverage of Beryl can be found at https://bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/radar/

Beryl will continue to move inland... into northeast Texas, Arkansas, and beyond.  It will lose its tropical cyclone status but still be a major rain-maker along the way.

Beryl broke a lot of records related to where and when it formed, rapidly intensified, and achieved Category 3 and then Category 5 intensity.  It became the only Category 4+ hurricane on record to pass through the southern Windward Islands, and then it was the fifth Category 4+ hurricane to pass within 60 miles of Jamaica on record.

This type of incredible early-season activity is attributable to the record-warm water temperatures in the tropical Atlantic.  When Beryl formed, the sea surface temperature in the "Main Development Region" (MDR) was already warmer than it normally would be at the warmest time of year, and the ocean heat content in the same region looked like it normally would in mid-September.

We are likely going to see more extreme record-breaking storms this season as water temperatures continue to be very anomalously warm AND we transition to La Niña which generally acts to reduce vertical wind shear in the tropical Atlantic and therefore enhance hurricane activity.

In terms of ACE (Accumulated Cyclone Energy), Beryl has boosted the 2024 tally to an incredible level for so early in the season.  The ACE is higher than any other year on record by this date (even 1933), and is actually already higher than 14% of all entire hurricane seasons going back to 1851!  The ACE this season would finally meet up with the climatological value if no additional activity occurred through August 31.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Tropical Storm Beryl about to enter Gulf of Mexico

After its very close and destructive encounter with Jamaica on Wednesday as a Category 4 hurricane, Bery weakened just slightly and tracked south of the Cayman Islands on Thursday at Category 3 intensity.  Then on Friday morning, it made landfall near Cozumel and Tulum at Category 2 intensity.  As of Friday afternoon, the intensity had decreased further to a tropical storm.

It will spend less than a day over land, then enter the Gulf of Mexico where it's expected to reintensify after the inland decay. How quickly it reorganizes will play a role in where it ends up for its final landfall.  A weaker storm exiting the Yucatan is more likely to stay further south, while a stronger storm is more likely to turn north, easily putting central Texas at risk... even eastern Texas has plenty of ensemble members near it.  At this point, the most likely still looks to be in the Brownsville to Corpus Christi span, but the trend has definitely been creeping northward, so keep a very close eye on updated forecasts.

As of now, there are no watches or warnings for the Gulf coast of mainland Mexico or Texas, but those should come later this evening or early Saturday.

And it's worth being aware that while the official forecast brings Beryl back up to Category 1 hurricane intensity by landfall, a stronger hurricane is not out of the question given Beryl's resilient and overachieving history. And as always, heavy rainfall will be a significant threat over a large area along the storm track:

I shared some preliminary NHC track and intensity verification stats on social media... spanning forecasts made through Friday morning:

Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/bmcnoldy.bsky.social/post/3kwjsv7prwf2c

X: https://x.com/BMcNoldy/status/1809184609009389912

Although NHC did correctly forecast rapid intensification, which is a notable achievement, Beryl blew past even those aggressive forecasts, so their intensity forecasts are overall biased low so far.  But the track forecasts have had very low error compared to their own 5-year average.

Looking at the Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) so far this season, Beryl has contributed A LOT... more than any other season on record had by this date.  In fact, if Beryl disappeared right now and nothing else formed, 2024 would finally catch up to climatology on August 30!  (I wouldn't recommend betting that nothing will form until August 30.)

After Beryl, the basin looks quiet for a while.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Beryl maintains Category 4 intensity as it hits Jamaica

Beryl has weakened from its peak 165 mph intensity, but not a lot... at 2pm EDT on Wednesday, the peak winds are still a hefty 140 mph... a Category 4 hurricane.  And that hurricane is hitting Jamaica on Wednesday afternoon before heading toward the Cayman Islands and then the Yucatan peninsula.

Vertical wind shear picked up noticeably on Tuesday, causing the storm to weaken only slightly and the satellite appearance to deteriorate a bit, but the ultra deep warm water in the Caribbean has given Beryl the boost it needs to overcome that shear.  The ocean heat content in the Caribbean has never been higher for this time of year, and looks more like the second week of September typically would.

Beryl's northern eyewall is scraping over the southern coast of Jamaica.  The radar in Jamaica has been inoperable for years, but there's a radar in Pilon, Cuba that is able to catch a glimpse of the eyewall over the mountainous terrain on Jamaica (so keep in mind you're seeing pretty high up by the time the radar beam is intercepting the eyewall).  As I write this, the western rainbands are just coming in range of the radar in Grand Cayman as well.  You can find these at https://bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/radar/

Jamaica only has three examples of Category 4+ hurricanes passing over/near it in the history books going back to 1851: Dean 2007, Ivan 2004, and Gilbert 1988.  So Beryl is only Jamaica's fourth encounter with a Category 4+ hurricane in at least 173 years.

The NHC forecast brings Beryl to the Yucatan peninsula on Friday, then somewhere along the Gulf coast on Sunday-Monday.  The intensity is very uncertain because each land interaction comes with its own unique set of weakening/reintensification scenarios.  In other words, you almost have to get past one to get a clearer picture of what you're headed to the next one with.

But, in 4-5 days, the track spread among global model ensembles spans the central Mexican Gulf coast through Texas and even into western Louisiana.  The highest clustering of tracks is near the US/Mexico border as of today.  In the maps shown below, the European model ensemble is on the left and the American model ensemble is on the right... in both cases, a similar spread exists, and they also both indicate that a stronger storm will be more prone to turn north, while weaker scenarios head straight west into Mexico.  Given Beryl's resilient history, one might be inclined to lean toward the stronger/northern solutions. 

Then, Invest 96L, the wave that's been tagging behind Beryl all along, is still struggling to develop, but there's occassional support in the models for eventual development in the Gulf of Mexico.  Far from a sure thing, but still something to pay attention to besides Beryl.  You can see its current appearance in the satellite loop at the top of the post; it just entered the eastern Caribbean, exactly in Beryl's footsteps.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Running out of adjectives to describe Hurricane Beryl

Beryl has broken (at least?) two more incredible records in the past day: 

1) On July 2, it became the earliest Category 5 hurricane on record in the Atlantic, beating the previous date by fifteen days (Emily on July 17, 2005)

2) With 165 mph peak winds, it became the strongest hurricane ever observed during July, beating the previous strongest by 5 mph (also Emily on July 17, 2005).  It maintained that 165 mph intensity for six hours.  The infrared satellite image at the top of this post is from its peak intensity.

Beryl was first upgraded to a Category 5 hurricane on Monday night, and as of Tuesday afternoon, Beryl is just shy of that mark as an upper-end Category 4 hurricane.

However, the anticipated stronger vertical wind shear in the central Caribbean is beginning to take its toll on the storm's structure and some weakening is imminent.  It will pass south of Hispaniola on Tuesday evening, then approach Jamaica on Wednesday, bringing extremely destructive wind and storm surge to the island.  This will be the worst storm for Jamaica since Dean 2007 and then Ivan 2004 before that... so a very historic and devastating landfall (or near landfall) is coming tomorrow.

The radar in Jamaica has been inoperable for a while, but we will have some distant radar coverage from Cuba and then from Grand Cayman, which you'll be able to find at https://bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/radar/

As far as timing goes, the graphic below shows the probability of tropical storm force winds and their most likely time of arrival, at least through the end of the forecast period on Sunday morning.

It will reach the Yucatan peninsula on Friday morning and re-emerge over the Gulf of Mexico on Friday evening.  There's still uncertainty in the model guidance about how far north it might turn once it's in the Gulf... and at this point, anywhere from Mexico to Texas to Louisiana should be paying extremely close attention and taking preliminary precautions.  Although the current NHC forecast has it at tropical storm intensity in the Gulf, there is certainly model guidance that suggests it could be a strong hurricane again by its final landfall somewhere along the Gulf coast.

The system behind Beryl, Invest 96L, continues to struggle to organize and its formation probabilities are decreasing every day.  However, it will bring unwanted unsettled rainy weather to the Leeward Islands on Wednesday-Thursday... the same places that just got hit by a Category 4 hurricane on Monday.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Beryl makes historic landfall in Windward Islands as Category 4 hurricane

Beryl continues its trek westward, and has now entered the eastern Caribbean.  The eye of the hurricane passed directly over the tiny island of Carriacou which lies between St. Vincent and Grenada in the southern Windward Islands.  The only other major hurricane that ever passed within 100 miles of Beryl's location on Monday morning was Ivan in September 2004, and that was at Category 3 intensity, making Beryl the first Category 4+ hurricane to pass through these islands in recorded history.  And again, it's only July 1.

It has actually intensified even more since yesterday, reaching peak winds of 150 mph on Monday -- nearly a Category 5 storm -- on July 1.  The previous earliest Category 4 hurricane was Dennis on July 8, 2005 (and the earliest Category 5 is Emily on July 17, 2005).

A long radar loop of the storm passing by Barbados is available at https://bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/radar/.

Beryl is unprecedented and record-breaking in several ways already, and it's only been around for three days.  Now it will spend the next 4 or so days in the Caribbean where the water temperature is as warm as (if not warmer than) what it would be at the peak of the season in mid-September.

Beryl is forecast to be near Jamaica on Wednesday, the Yucatan peninsula on Friday, then the southern Gulf of Mexico on Saturday.  Despite the extremely warm water ahead of it, some stronger vertical wind shear is likely going to knock the intensity down a bit by the time it gets to the central Caribbean in a couple days.  Once it enters the Gulf of Mexico, it's most likely going to continue westward, but there's some support in the model guidance for a gradual north bend which could potentially (though not likely) bring it into Texas.

The feature we've been tracking as Invest 94L was briefly upgraded to Tropical Storm Chris in the Bay of Campeche but has already moved inland into Mexico and dissipated.  It was a named storm for just 12 hours.

The easterly wave right behind Beryl, Invest 96L, has lower prospects for development now than in recent days.  NHC has dropped the odds of formation to 50%, and it looks very disorganized on Monday afternoon.

The next name on the list is Debby.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Beryl rapidly intensifies to become unprecedented Category 4 hurricane in June

Since yesterday's post when Beryl just reached Category 1 hurricane intensity, it has exploded and in less than 24 hours it's now a Category 4 hurricane.  It's hard to communicate how unbelievable this is.

The earliest there has ever been a Category 4 hurricane anywhere in the Atlantic was July 8 (Dennis 2005) and that was near Jamaica.  The earliest there has ever been a Category 4+ hurricane east of the Caribbean in the "Main Development Region" was August 7 (Unnamed 1899). And one more incredible stat from Sam Lillo (a good follow on Twitter: @splillo) is that although this intensification rate has happened just a handful of times before, the earliest it ever happened was September 1.  By the way, the earliest Category 5 on record was Emily on July 17, 2005.

24-hour infrared satellite animation spanning early afternoon Saturday through early afternoon Sunday.  Tropical storm to Category 4 hurricane in this time.

With La Niña on the way and the ocean temperatures already looking like the second week of September, this is precisely the type of outlier event that people have been talking about for months heading into this season.  When you have an unprecedented favorable environment, you're bound to see unprecedented tropical cyclone activity.

The NHC forecast maintains Beryl at major hurricane intensity through Thursday, then weakening somewhat as it nears the Yucatan Peninsula on Friday, though still a very strong and dangerous hurricane.  The official track forecast follows the model guidance closely, which is tightly clustered with virtually no outliers anymore.

We will have ground-based radar coverage of the hurricane from Barbados, and you can find the latest long animation at https://bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/radar/. 

Elsewhere, Invest 94L has crossed over the Yucatan Peninsula and is now over the Bay of Campeche where it has a very brief window to develop before its final encounter with land. It's quite close to happening, and NHC is giving it an 80% probability.

And finally, Invest 96L is following in Beryl's footsteps and has a 70% chance of development in the coming week.  It will reach the Lesser Antilles on Wednesday-Thursday, just 2-3 days after Beryl's significant and historical landfall -- a very unwelcome visitor.

The next two names on the list are Chris and Debby.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Beryl becomes extremely rare June hurricane east of the Caribbean

Invest 95L was upgraded to Tropical Depression 2 on Friday afternoon and then to the second named storm of the season, Beryl, on Friday night.  It is taking full advantage of the September-like conditions in the tropical Atlantic and is now a Category 1 hurricane as of Saturday afternoon...  the furthest east a hurricane has ever formed this early in the year.  It's expected to reach Category 3 intensity by the time it reaches the Lesser Antilles on Monday.

As of Saturday afternoon, NHC is forecasting Beryl to reach the Lesser Antilles midday Monday and then be in the vicinity of Jamaica on Wednesday.  During that trek, it should maintain major hurricane intensity, then perhaps weaken slightly as it nears the Yucatan Peninsula on Friday due to slightly stronger vertical wind shear.  It will still be a dangerous hurricane though... an extrapolated forecast track would be centered near Cozumel by Friday, but as you can see below, the cone of uncertainty would also include areas from Belize up to western Cuba.

This is not normal.  June 30 is early for the first hurricane of the season (technical aside: I say June 30 because as of now, the 18:00 UTC data point in the working best track is 60 kt, a tropical storm... the 00:00 UTC data point on June 30 will be at hurricane intensity).  The last time it happened earlier was in 2012 (Chris on June 21), and the median date over the past fifty years is August 4.  One disclaimer related to this chart: Hurricane Alex occurred in January 2016, but I don't count that as part of the 2016 season; it was meteorologically a late-comer to the 2015 season.

As I pointed out yesterday, there has been just one hurricane formation east of the Caribbean in June, and that was during the all-time record-breaking hurricane season of 1933.  So to say this is extremely rare is an understatement.

Two things could really make Beryl extraordinary if it reaches at least Category 3 ("major hurricane") intensity by Sunday evening: 1) WHERE it's happening and 2) WHEN it's happening.  Since records began in 1851, there have been only two known major hurricanes to occur prior to July 7 and they were both in the Gulf of Mexico:

    - Alma (June 8, 1966)

    - Audrey (June 27, 1957)

And ZERO major hurricanes have crossed the Lesser Antilles earlier than August 4 -- that was the infamous Hurricane Allen in 1980.  This would be a little over a month ahead of that incredible record if it happens (which is the official forecast).

So, back to the storm itself.  Beryl is moving over ocean temperatures that are as warm as they'd be at the peak of the season in the second week of September, so there is endless fuel.  Model guidance for intensity has a bit of a spread, but as of now, it seems likely that Beryl's intensity should peak ~ Category 3 on Monday-Wednesday.

Beyond Wednesday, there's also strong agreement in the models that Beryl will continue the same motion, which will bring it into the Yucatan Peninsula on Friday.

Other than Hurricane Beryl, Invest 94L is over the Yucatan Peninsula now and will enter the Bay of Campeche tomorrow where it has a 50% probability of becoming a tropical cyclone before moving back inland over Mexico.  The primary threat associated with this is heavy rain and the resulting flash flooding.

Then, there is another easterly wave right behind Beryl that has a 70% probability of becoming a tropical cyclone within the coming week.  It should be tagged as Invest 96L already, but for whatever reason, it's not.  Through at least the next five days, it looks like it will take the same path as Beryl... very bad news for the Lesser Antilles. It looks like a bit of a mess in the center of this infrared satellite animation, but as we saw with Beryl, that can change quickly when the ocean says it's already the second week of September.

The next two names on the list are Chris and Debby.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Second named storm, Beryl, likely to form east of Caribbean

Much like last year, the deep tropical Atlantic isn't waiting until August to wake up.  If you recall, Bret and Cindy both formed east of the Lesser Antilles in June last year... we haven't had the B or C storms yet this year, but that could soon change.  (by the way, the next two names on this year's list are Beryl and Chris.)

There are three features of interest peppered across the deep tropics: Invest 94L is located in the far western Caribbean, Invest 95L is located about 1500 miles east of the Windward Islands, and an untagged disturbance is just east of that and is located about 2400 miles east of the Windward Islands.  As of Friday morning, the National Hurricane Center is giving these a 30%, 90%, and 20% chance of development within the week.  Invest 95L is poised to become Tropical Storm Beryl this weekend, if not sooner.

If you're thinking this seems like a lot of activity to watch in the tropics for June, you'd be right.

Something that is catching a lot of attention is the ocean heat content (OHC) averaged across the Main Development Region (MDR) -- the MDR term was defined about three decades ago to be the slice of the Atlantic from 10-20°N and stretching from Central America to Africa, and it is where the vast majority of major hurricanes develop.  The ocean heat content is a measure of the heat stored through a depth of the ocean, as opposed to the sea surface temperature which as the term implies, is only at the surface.  Alarmingly, as of today, the MDR-averaged ocean heat content is not only a record for the date again, it's where it typically would be during the first week of September.  This means the ocean out there already thinks it's the peak of hurricane season, yet it's more than two months away.

https://bmcnoldy.earth.miami.edu/tropics/ohc/

I'll first focus on Invest 95L, or soon-to-be-Beryl.  This is a potent easterly wave that exited the African coast on June 25 and has been cruising westward at 15-20 mph. It will continue to track westward and will reach the Lesser Antilles on Monday, likely as a hurricane.  For reference, the climatological date of first hurricane formation is August 11.

As Michael Lowry recently pointed out on Twitter, the only other time a storm became a hurricane east of the Caribbean during June was in 1933, the all-time blockbuster hurricane season.

https://twitter.com/MichaelRLowry/status/1806172822370226218

Once this enters the Caribbean on Monday, there's high confidence it will continue westward through the Caribbean, reaching Central America or the Yucatan Peninsula next Friday.  In global model ensembles, there are a few outliers that take it further north, but the trend has been whittling away at those outliers.

http://arctic.som.ou.edu/tburg/products/realtime/tropical/

Invest 94L will pass over the Yucatan Peninsula later today and into Saturday, then emerge into the Bay of Campeche where it will have about one day to develop.  While development into a tropical cyclone is unlikely, it will be a major rain producer in the same areas that got a lot of rain from Alberto a couple weeks ago as it movers ashore near Tampico, Mexico on Sunday evening into Monday. 

The easterly wave that's east of Invest 95L is somewhat favored to develop by the global models, and it's also likely to track west toward the Lesser Antilles, reaching the islands just a couple days after it (Wednesday or so).  Their proximity to each other complicates the forecast, so for now, it would be prudent to see what 95L does before looking too close at what this will do.  Furthermore, there is a large Saharan dust plume immediately north of these two features, so that could also play a big role if any of the dry dusty air gets ingested into their circulations.

Enhanced satellite image of the Atlantic showing clouds in gray and dry/dusty air in shades of yellow to red.

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X

Two disturbances to watch in the coming days

As a brief follow-up since my previous post on Monday, the season's first named storm, Alberto, did indeed form in the southwest Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday, then drifted westward into Mexico... making landfall near Tampico as a tropical storm.

Today, there are two more systems of interest, one headed for Florida/Georgia and one expected to form in the same area and fashion as Alberto did.  The one headed toward Florida is tagged as Invest 92L.  Fortunately, neither one is expected to intensify much, but another round of heavy rainfall will be a huge concern with the one following in Alberto's footsteps.

A radar animation of Invest 92L from the Jacksonville NWS radar is shown below, spanning the morning hours from 4am-9am.

This disturbance is getting more organized by the hour, but is rapidly running out of time before it's over land.  However, model guidance shows that it will get picked up by an approaching trough and *could* be back over the ocean (including the warm Gulf Stream) early next week where it has an even better chance of becoming a tropical cyclone.  That is, if there's anything left of it after 2-3 days over land.

Shifting our attention 1000 miles to the southwest, another disturbance is brewing over the Yucatan peninsula and the National Hurricane Center is giving it a 60% probability of becoming a tropical cyclone in the next seven days.  As I mentioned in the beginning, the evolution and track of this system will very closely mimic what we just saw with Alberto.

The next couple of names on the list are Beryl and Chris. Tidbit: the first five names on this year's list are all original from the 1982 list when they were first used (there are six lists of names that get reused).  So, Alberto, Beryl, Chris, Debby, and Ernesto were all used in 1982, 1988, 1994, ..., and 2024.  This year, we have two new names on the list: Francine and Milton.  They replace Florence and Michael which were retired after the 2018 season. 

• Visit the Tropical Atlantic Headquarters.
• Subscribe to get these updates emailed to you.
• Follow me on Bluesky and X