Something heading your way?

Yeah it's looking likely to have an impact here at the very least. A couple of models have it coming straight for us. For some reason, we often get a 'Mother's Day' typhoon that threatens parts of Taiwan - then it usually goes dead in June and the first half of July.

How's it going over in your neck of the woods?

Great weather here. Feels similar to Taitung, but a few degrees cooler. Very cool mornings. Lower humidity. Summers will be about 1 degree below Taitung levels. High water is an issue during hurricanes as the entire state is about 2 feet above sea level!

"Forecaster warns of very stormy year

While the nation suffers the severest water shortage in 68 years, at least six tropical storms have formed in the northwest Pacific Ocean since January, a record high in more than four decades, a former Central Weather Bureau forecaster said."

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2015/05/05/2003617541

It will be interesting if frequency is the same here in the Atlantic.

So where are you exactly Dan? It will give me an excuse to track storms over there as well!

My feeling is that the one here is gonna re-curve and travel up the east coast, which will be good for the surfers but will end up having a net negative effect on rainfall for the south. However, several models still crashing it into Taiwan so we will wait and watch.

Looks like you'll get something out of this.

We're currently north of Tampa, staying with relatives while waiting to close on a house that we have under contract. If all goes well, we'll be in this house within 2 weeks or so. I'm not going to jinx the deal with pictures and such. Suffice to say it's about 10 miles SE of the one-gas-station town of Floral City, Florida. Beautiful spot. I'm currently trying to figure out how we're going to get Internet. No cable or DSL available. Satellite dish Internet apparently sucks. I'm looking in to a technology called WISP. It uses radio towers and frequencies.

A couple weather sites:
http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/
http://www.hwn.org/

And of course snakes:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_snakes_of_Florida

Good luck with the house! Had a look at some photos of the area and it looks great. Watch out for the recurving hurricane that gets into the gulf though! 2 feet above sea level doesn't sound like a lot.

Shaping up to be an interesting storm. If that heads a little farther west than predicted here, then recurves, you might be in for some significant rain.

I don't expect anything too serious. With a bit of luck we might get a decent rain on Sunday or Monnday. It's going to be weakened by contact with PPE and then once they start angling away from you to the north east then you can basically forget it. It's also travelling quite fast.

Seems to be another one behind it so see what happens with that. Also noticed that youv'e got something going on over there.

Historically, have there been any big hurricanes that have hit Tampa? It's a little bit tricky to get in there but should be quite possible.

PS. There seems to be a problem with the formatting on the weather wiki - can you take a look at it when you get the time?

There have been a number of hurricanes to hit Tampa Bay, but it doesn't seem to happen with great frequency. See http://www.bestplaces.net/docs/studies/hurricane_hotspots.aspx and http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1921_Tampa_Bay_hurricane. I checked on the elevation of this house we're hoping to get. It's 51 feet. And that's inland. Florida is a natural disaster waiting to happen. There's no bedrock under anything either so sink holes are common. Insurance rates are high.

I had a look at the wiki and couldn't see anything. What are you seeing? I updated it recently, so that might be creating something odd for you, but I couldn't find anything. Let me know.

Yeah the wiki is fine now. Temporary glitch i guess. It was laying out what was typed in one very long line.

Seems hurricanes are pretty rare in Tampa. A big one in 1858, another in 1914 - that turned over a steamship as well as a 15ft storm surge and flooding most of Tampa - i think you are probably due for the next one.

But 61 feet (was it?) should be plenty!

This hurricane seems to be going for the record for affecting the greatest stretch of habitated land ever. If it follows the forecast then it's going to arc almost perfectly up the east coast of America.

This is a bit like playing 'chicken' with a mack truck. Noul has become a super typhoon, and it's currently heading straight at us, but all the forecast models have it about to recurve away from us. I've held off on doing much in the way of preparation because of that but i do hope they are right. Otherwise we're gonna be in the thick of a super typhoon within 24 hrs.

If you were on Orchid Island though then it might be time to put on the brown corduroys. They are going to get seriously hammered whatever way it goes from here.

They've got it coming pretty close to you. The surfers are going to have a blast.

Yeah, the waves should be massive tomorrow - already big today.

Hot, muggy, and calm right now.

It's not meant to actually veer off the collision course with taiwan until tomorrow morning. It will be panic stations if it doesn't coz that would leave us about seven minutes to prepare.

So it did, recurve, as advertised, and it was windy for a few hours but nothing serious. Down the mountain it was relatively calm. 27mm in the guage and no huge falls throughout Taiwan.

New typhoon coming behind it - will be another week before that gets anywhere near us.

Meanwhile, there's a serious looking rain band stretching up the west coast - not sure if that's typhoon related or a mei yu front but they've had 40+mm in the last hour up there.