Bertha, Cristobal, Dolly (and Edouard?)

Bertha is finally gone, after surviving nearly 18 days, 7.75 of which of those were as a Hurricane. She broke all kinds of records, but didn't do that much damage except scaring the folks in Bermuda a bit.

Cristobal formed on Saturday, and moved up the Carolina coast, from about Charleston up to where she is now, due east of Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Up until 11 PM last night, Tropical Storm Warnings had been posted for eastern Carteret, Hyde, Pamlico, Dare and Currituck County (up to the North Carolina/Virginia line), but those have since been dropped as Cristobal's TS winds are supposed to stay out to sea (and only briefly touched Cape Lookout) in Carteret County). There is a chance the storm could make landfall in southern Nova Scotia near Yarmouth by Tuesday afternoon, and move past Halifax that night as a Tropical Storm, although it's a bit too early to tell. Cristobal would then move past St. John's, Newfoundland, by midnight Wednesday night.

Dolly is more troubling. As of 7 AM CDT (8 AM EDT), Currently the storm is just just off the northern tip of the Yucatan Peninsula. She was supposed to stay over land longer, but just grazed this landmass, and is now in the process of reforming in the warm Gulf waters. Currently estimates have landfall late Wednesday near South Padre Island, Texas, however, anywhere along this line is really in the path and needs to watch out. In fact if it hit near the northern end, near Victoria/Victoria County, it would not be AS bad because they really need the rain, and the area just north of there up through San Antonio and Austin is in a level D4 (or the worst kind) of drought. However, I'm leary about this forecast because these Gulf storms seem always to curve farther to the right than forecast (for instance see here starting around September 20 where they were calling for Rita to come ashore down near Matagorda Bay, and she ended up making landfall near Sabine Pass, Texas/Louisiana, some 200 miles to the east (and consequently aiming towards and then missing Texas altogether. We'll have to wait and see. The official intensity has it coming ashore as a Category 1, however with the new track more north (and less over land), it could range as high as a Category 2 or even 3 (major hurricane). Check out the latest forecasts for South Padre here calling for hurricane conditions on Wednesday and Wednesday night.

Finally, there is not as of yet an Edouard, however there is a vigorous tropical wave just about to emerge off the coast of Africa. It is way to early to have any idea where this could end up, but if I were going to the Caribbean in the next week or so, I would keep an eye out.

More updates as the 11, 2 and 5 updates come in on Dolly.

UPDATE: Cristobal is now east of the VA/NC state line, and has winds of 65 mph, but should not strengthen and should start to lose tropical characteristics tomorrow.

Dolly: A Hurricane watch is now in effect from San Fernando, Mexico, up through the Mexican/US Border, and all the way up to Port O'Connor, including the cities of Brownsville and Corpus Christi. This is until further notice, and includes Cameron, Willacy, Kenedy, Kleburg, Nueces, Aransas, San Patricio, Refugio and Calhoun Counties. Further, a tropical storm watch is in effect from La Pesca, Mexico to San Fernando, and from Port O'Connor, Texas up to San Luis Pass. This includes Matagorda and Brazoria Counties, both being in the greater Houston metro, but does not include (yet) Galveston County/Island/City. No evacuations are planned as of yet, but officials are trying to decide what to do. It's looking like landfall sometime later on Wednesday.