What can we expect from Ophelia?

AccuWeather

AccuWeather's Lead Hurricane Expert, Dan Kottlowski, weighs in on what to expect as Ophelia makes its way up the coast.

Transcript

00:00 Remember that well before any other source, AccuWeather highlighted the risk for flooding,

00:04 gusty winds, coastal flooding, and power outages along the East Coast into this weekend.

00:09 For a closer look at Ophelia's impacts, we are now joined by AccuWeather lead hurricane

00:13 expert Dan Kotlowski.

00:15 Hey, Dan, thanks for joining us tonight.

00:17 It looks like Ophelia is really intensifying as far as those winds are concerned.

00:22 Yeah, Ophelia has managed to go from a non-tropical system to a pure tropical storm system.

00:31 So the winds around the storm have become more concentrated, and that's why it's increased

00:36 intensity.

00:37 It's also moved over very deep warm water, and it will continue to do so for the next

00:42 couple of hours or so.

00:43 As it moves close to the coast, it'll move out of that really deep warm water, but still

00:48 there's a possibility that it could still ramp up and actually become a Category 1 hurricane.

00:55 And Dan, if Ophelia were to become a hurricane before landfall, how would that change the

01:00 expected impacts, if at all?

01:03 Probably not much, because we're expecting a high-end tropical storm anyhow, so just

01:08 about a 5-10 mile an hour difference is not going to make that much difference.

01:13 We're still going to have the heavy rain.

01:15 We're still going to have the impressive storm surge, which again is going to be 5-6 feet

01:21 in some of the inland areas coming out of Albemarle Sound and through the Sound areas

01:29 across the easternmost portions of North Carolina.

01:33 The thing to remember, people need to remember here, is the fact that there's all this water

01:37 piling in, you've got heavy rain falling at the same time, so there's going to be a lot

01:41 of high water with this system.

01:44 Now this area has experienced storms like this before, but like any other storm, each

01:49 storm is different, so you want to really give this a pure thought and you don't want

01:54 to take chances with the weather it's going to bring.

01:57 You got it, Dan.

01:58 And the projected track of Ophelia seems to have shifted a little bit to the west.

02:02 Can you talk about how that might change the expected impacts this weekend even farther

02:07 north?

02:08 Yeah, the concern we have is if it continues to shift a little bit to the west, not only

02:13 it gets a lot closer obviously to Wilmington, North Carolina, but also it shifts a little

02:18 bit to the left.

02:21 But I don't think that really makes much difference along the coastal areas, because this has

02:26 a very large wind field.

02:28 The winds, the radius of tropical storm force winds extend outward almost 250 miles out,

02:36 so it doesn't matter, you know, maybe a little bit of a wiggle to the left or to the right,

02:40 it's still going to cause big concerns.

02:42 As it moves inland, that means the rain shield it produces will be a little bit further west

02:47 and also a little bit further north.

02:50 You got it, Dan.

02:51 And you know what?

02:52 It looks to me like just looking at how long it's going to take for Ophelia to get from

02:56 say Wilmington or say Moorhead City, North Carolina to say areas outside of D.C., it's

03:02 going to take about 48 hours.

03:04 I mean that is a slow trek for a storm of this size to make, so we're going to be dealing

03:09 with the impacts with all that water.

03:11 We know we will.

03:12 Thank you very much, Dan Kotlowski.

03:14 We'll continue to bring you the latest on Ophelia all weekend long here on the AccuWeather

03:18 Network.

03:19 You can also get updates around the clock online at accuweather.com and on the free

03:23 AccuWeather app.

03:24 So, yeah, Dan, appreciate you joining us.

03:27 Looks like you're still there.

03:28 But yes, we do appreciate your insight on this.

03:32 And I think the best, the thing that you said that hits me the strongest is every storm

03:36 is different.

03:37 You know, you said there have been storms like this before in North Carolina, but every

03:40 storm is different.

03:41 And we know that a lot of areas along the Outer Banks have been given evacuation warnings

03:46 and we need them to heed those warnings.

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