Talking the Tropics With Mike: Tropical storm Lisa forms over the Central Caribbean

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* No threats from “Lisa” or any of the tropics for NE Fl./SE Ga. through this week....

Heavy showers & storms with an area of low pressure have organized enough over the Caribbean to be upgraded Mon. morning to tropical storm Lisa. A building upper ridge to the north of the system will take the storm on a beeline for Central America - to Belize - by Wed. Time will be running out for Lisa to become a powerful storm as landfall will be midday Wed. to Wed. evening, & Lisa’s organization remains poor. How much the disturbance strengthens will be dependent on how quickly it can truly get its act together along with any potential land interaction - with Honduras - before the arrival in/near Belize. There will be no impact to the Lower 48 of the U.S.

The Caribbean is a typical “hot bed” for late season development & will be an area that needs to closely watched for additional development over the next 1-2 weeks or so. In fact, most global models shows low pressure trying to develop over the Caribbean &/or SW Atlantic this coming weekend into the following week.

Water vapor loop shows pockets of dry air (dark blue) across portions of the Atlantic Basin along with a lot of “swirls” (low pressure) along with “bands” of higher moisture near & ahead of fronts - common as we get deeper into autumn:

October origins:

Averages below based on climatology for the Atlantic Basin through September. This season so far is well below avg.:

Wind shear:

Saharan dust spreads west each year from Africa by the prevailing winds (from east to west over the Atlantic). Dry air - yellow/orange/red/pink. Widespread dust is indicative of dry air that can impede the development of tropical cyclones. However, sometimes “wanna’ be” waves will just wait until they get to the other side of - or away from - the plume then try to develop if other conditions are favorable. In my personal opinion, way too much is made about the presence of Saharan dust & how it relates to tropical cyclones. In any case, we’ve had several large dust plumes spread west to the Caribbean & Gulf with the peak of Saharan dust typically in June & July.

2022 names..... “Martin” is the next name on the Atlantic list (names are picked at random by the World Meteorological Organization... repeat every 6 years). Historic storms are retired [Florence & Michael in ’18... Dorian in ’19 & Laura, Eta & Iota in ‘20 & Ida in ‘21]). In fact, this year’s list of names is rather infamous with “Charley”, “Frances”, “Jeanne” & “Ivan” retired from the ‘04 list (all hit Fl.) & “Matthew” was retired in 2016. The WMO decided - beginning last year - that the Greek alphabet will be no longer used & instead there will be a supplemental list of names if the first list is exhausted (has only happened three times - 2005, 2020 & 2021). The naming of tropical cyclones began on a consistent basis in 1953. More on the history of naming tropical cyclones * here *.