Helene targets Florida as the storm continues to strengthen

AccuWeather

AccuWeather's Bernie Rayno and Alex DaSilva expect Helene to strengthen into a hurricane and then into a major storm on landfall over Florida on Thursday, Sept. 26.

Transcript

00:00Alex, let's take a look at the satellite presentation.

00:03When we talked to you a couple of hours ago, we thought that Helene was certainly beginning

00:07to strengthen.

00:08Still not a hurricane, but oh so close.

00:11Yeah, awfully close to hurricane strength right now, winds of 70 miles per hour.

00:15You can really see those thunderstorms, that deep orange color continuing to fire around

00:20the center of circulation.

00:22That's essentially the piece we were missing yesterday.

00:24All of that convection was off to the east.

00:26Now it has circled around the eye of the storm.

00:28If we take a look at the Cuban radar here, you can see a structure starting to form an

00:34eye right now.

00:35We're not quite there yet, it's not really tight yet, but you can start to see a little

00:40bit of a structure beginning to form, especially on that northern and western side of that

00:44eye wall.

00:45So I think when that closes in, when that fully goes around, when we really see those

00:49yellows and reds tightly in a circle, that's where we can really see the explosive development.

00:54Want to show you the eyepath as we go through the rest of today.

00:57In fact, we're already projecting this to be a Category 2 hurricane as we head toward

01:02this evening.

01:03Of course, that is winds of 96 to 110 miles per hour, but the strengthening is not going

01:10to stop there, Alex.

01:11Indeed, it's not.

01:13You can really see a lot of that green really firing around Helene right now.

01:16That is lots of moisture, and you can see those wispy clouds to the north of the storm

01:21moving in a clockwise formation there, essentially pushing that dry air right out of the way

01:25like a football player, pushing it right out of the way.

01:28And so that is the storm essentially breathing right now.

01:31Those high wispy clouds, you know, that's how a storm essentially breathes, and so there's

01:34really no problem with the storm breathing right now.

01:37It's dealing with a little bit of land interaction right now near the Yucatan Peninsula, but

01:41once it moves away from the Yucatan, it could be off to the races from there.

01:45Now, as we were talking about ocean heat content, and that is the depth of the ocean water,

01:50we found another way to show you this.

01:53Instead of looking at these numbers, let's look at the actual depth of the 80 degree

01:59Fahrenheit water, and this graphic in the reds showing you it's 175 meters, so we're

02:06talking over 400 feet all the way down into the Gulf of Mexico where we're getting that

02:1280 degree water temperature, Alex, and that's, as you always say, it's like rocket fuel.

02:17It certainly is.

02:18Again, take a look at those numbers, multiply them by three to get the feet, and so you

02:21can see right in the path of the storm, we have very high ocean heat content, or again,

02:26that depth of that warm water going down three, 400, maybe even a little bit more feet below

02:31the surface of the ocean, that 80 degree line.

02:34Again, this is going to have plenty of fuel all the way until the point of landfall, which

02:38is why we're concerned this is going to be a major hurricane.

02:41It even is going to have a shot to become a category four hurricane before landfall,

02:44I think.

02:45Let's take a look at the exclusive Accuweather landfall forecast, Alex.

02:49We made the decision this morning as far west as Mexico Beach, as far east as Horseshoe

02:56Beach or Steinhatchee tomorrow evening.

03:00Yes, certainly the storm is expected to move in there somewhere on the western side of

03:04the Big Bend area.

03:05Again, eastern side of that storm is really going to be piling up the water.

03:09We are very, very concerned about a 15 to 20 foot storm surge just east of the center

03:14of circulation.

03:15This is going to be a very, very large storm, so these impacts are going to be felt well

03:19away from the center of circulation.

03:22Accuweather lead hurricane expert Alex DaSilva.

03:24Alex, thanks for joining us here on Accuweather Early.

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