As of early this morning, Hurricane Joaquin is still a formidable category 3 hurricane, spinning north of the Bahamas, moving northeast, away from the Islands on it’s way out to sea. After spending more than 24 hours over the Central Bahamas, undoubtedly, extensive damage has been left in it’s wake.
Obviously, all eyes have been focused on Joaquin and it’s future track. That future track a north to northeast track, staying off the US coastline. With that said, the East coast has another problem on it’s plate. As a massive area of high pressure across Quebec contrasts with a low across the Southeast, a massive amount of wind has been pushed down the eastern Seaboard, from the northeast. That has created beach erosion and coastal flooding from New England, to the Carolina Coast. The worst of it, south of us. If Joaquin does track within a couple hundred miles of the mid-Atlantic coast, addition beach erosion and coastal flooding is likely from New Jersey to the Virginia early next week. Add in a tropical moisture stream from Joaquin, into that low over the Southeast, and flooding rains are likely to continue through the weekend across the Carolinas, with many towns picking up 8-15" of rain.
For us, I don’t expect heavy rain, however, patchy light rain and drizzle is likely through the morning. These patches of drizzle become fewer and farther between this afternoon. Overall, rain totals for us through the weekend are generally less than 0.10". So not a lot of rain, but just enough to keep it damp at times. Pockets of drizzle are fewer and farther between on Sunday, and we may even have a few breaks in the overcast away from the coast. It’ll be a cool day, but it’s not a bad morning to get in a walk if you’re joining everyone in town for the Making Strides Walk. http://main.acsevents.org/site/TR?sid=16393&type=fr_informational&pg=informational&fr_id=70168
The other story has been the wind. The onshore wind will once again be active today, gusting over 30mph. In fact, a wind advisory in place until 3pm for the Cape and Islands, where wind gusts between 35-45mph likely occur. There’s also a coastal flood advisory this afternoon from 3-6pm for minor coastal flooding during the afternoon high tide on east to northeast facing shorelines.
Next week looks much better, temps back into the 60s with mainly dry weather prevailing. (Large seas and rip currents will continue into mid-week).
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