The ingredients for a storm to develop in the northwestern Caribbean Sea or the southern Gulf of Mexico are coming together more or less as expected. On the current schedule, a storm will develop midweek and track toward the northern Gulf or the west coast of Florida . Impacts could begin as early as Thursday.
How strong the storm will be and exactly where the most intense effects will occur is an open question. There is a general consensus in the various computer forecasts on how the steering pattern will evolve, but it’s the details that make a difference in whether a storm hits one location or another location hundreds of miles away.
A robust upper disturbance just moving ashore in western Canada is forecast to develop into a large, quasi-stationary upper-level low-pressure system over Oklahoma , Arkansas and surrounding states. Meanwhile, a high-pressure system will establish itself east of Florida. This pattern should be in place mid- to late-week. The flow between those two features will be, broadly speaking, from south to north, providing a path for a storm in the southern Gulf…