It’s clear to see from this latest sat image that Ernesto is becoming better organised. She’s now showing signs of stronger, wrap-around convection over the centre with overall shape much more concentric. During Friday, the rapid 20-25 mph forward speed was creating shear and made this system look less organised with a lot of it’s convection off to the east but it appears the storm is slowing and with a good overall environment surrounding and out ahead of her, there’s no reason to think she can’t become a hurricane within the next 48 hours.

The below map shows a good consenses in the models of Ernesto’s path through this weekend and into early next week taking her through the Caribbean Sea. The models show this system becoming at least a category 1 hurricane in the Caribbean Sea, just south of Jamaica but with very warm waters and a conducive environment. There should be cause for concern here that this storm may intensify rapidly and I don’t think we can rule out the potential for Ernesto perhaps by Monday ramping up up Major status (Cat 3) and take aim at the northeast coast of the Yucatan perhaps by Tuesday of next week.

Looking further out, though we can’t take too much from the models this far out but the scenario must be looked at given her current track and where shes heading. The US Gulf Coast needs to begin watching this storm carefully as history would suggest and where the models have this storm going. While anywhere along the US Gulf Coast may see this (or not at all), the general models become ‘sprayed’ this far out as there’s too many variables with US and Gulf of Mexico weather patterns in later next week.

One thing that is certain is that if this storm survives and continues a NW track into the Gulf, waters are very warm and if the atmosphere is good, she could pose as a significant threat to the US.

More later!