Well back again with the big breezes. I don't want to alarm you but our Caribbean wave has just taken a noticeable direction towards formation. I bet it is a tropical depression as I write.

Not to scare you, but this disturbance is currently on a classic west-riding track. Yes, it could do anything -including diminishing to nothing. However, this one is looking like it is coming together. It has defied the odds and is the first disturbance to ever develop in the eastern Caribbean in early July. My first thought was to give a shout to this board to get people looking anyway. It could still go anywhere...

We'll see tomorrow...

Have been watching for two days already.
Weather Underground and Intellicast.com are the best sources for satellite images. Once there is a "declared" storm NOAA has excellent probabilities charts. At this there is no closed circulation to the system and it is moving along it's track so fast (30 mph WNW) that it's having trouble getting organized.
Pressure gradients are not particularly low (1009 as the system passed Caracas) at this time, and those are pretty good indicators of how bad things are going to get.
We are not in a panic, but it's clearly a storm to watch - boats should get to port. Yesterday in St. Lucia there were wind gusts to 52 MPH. No reports today of wind strength. If you check weather sites at all - then check them all. They vary a lot, and some are wildly inaccurate. I read one today that reported winds of 202.6 MPH at Half Moon Caye. Typos like that can give you a heart attack.
Bottom line tho - after all the predictions are done, Keith, Mitch and Iris all did their own thing, defying all predictions. Build a stong house, buy insurance and on the first of Juen start stocking up on spam, spaghetti, ziplock bags, and batteries. A little chocolate milk never hurts for comfort food.
This system has a large "footprint" and we are probably going to get wet.

Old information. Claudette has organized and has now been officially declared a tropical storm at 45mph. Pressure is 1006.

I would say Belize is safe from the last loop I looked at. The storm is definitiely trending WNW towards Jamaica.

keep watching.
here's my working list of links. its madness i know, but i work from madness...

//AmbergrisCaye.com/hurricane/links.html

a short summation list would have these i suppose:

Weather Underground - maps and textual descriptions of conditions
http://www.wunderground.com/tropical/

navy site- the best, tho no textual information like at wunderground, the textual descriptions of conditions..
http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/tc_pages/tc_home.html

discussion site. everybody and joes uncle telling you whats up. everyone an expert, everyone guessing, but there are jewels in the rough. you get used to reading the more knowledgeable folks after awhile...
http://www.gopbi.com/weather/special/storm/letstalk/bbs.html

wow is it ever windy on Half Moon http://www.wunderground.com/global/BH.html
:rolleyes:

Ahh, I take that back. While the storm has impacted an upper level trough, it hasn't lifted northwest yet. The convection has shifted, but the center is still straight west in your direction.

Difficult call. The upper level Low is supposed to hamper strong development. Even if it stays dead west it could be held down as a tropical storm.

The storm is moving at extraordinary forward speed. It was only a wisp 48 hours ago in the Atlantic east of Tobago. Now it is starting to slow slightly.

The pros are saying there's a weakness in a high pressure ridge above it in 36 hours that will pull it up. Eyes on it til it lifts...

(Pressure now 1003)

See 1960's "Abby" for reference [No I'm not saying it will take this track] The next year "Anna" took a similar July track. Storms are rare in early July:

http://weather.unisys.com/hurricane/atlantic/1960/ABBY/track.gif

Thanks, you all, for all of the great links.

I'm glad they took off that post I made last night. I rushed back to the board today to cancel it.

All night the storm was tracking west. So much so they had even gone to mentioning a possible Belize landfall in official reports.

In a direct application of Murphy's Law, the storm turned right and away from Belize as soon as I went to bed.

Oh well, that works for you anyway. Sorry if it caused undue stress.

It has turned more north and dropped to 988 millibars. It should be hurricane at that pressure. North is towards us on the SW Florida coast -But, they are saying it will return to NW and move towards Texas.

Belize safe...