re: Hurricane Earl - Mexico Bound

Another thing to look at as the system moves towards the Yucatan is equatorial wave forcing. The MJO is kind of the big player here but there are some smaller faster moving waves that also play a role. A combined MJO/KW just pushed across the Atlantic and Africa setting off the string of disturbances that we are seeing right now.



The MJO doesn't really appear to be influencing things across the Caribbean and Gulf too much right now but may start to suppress things in the WCARB/Gulf by next week (orange shades). Also, note the suppressed area out closer to Africa that seems to be inhibiting 96L:



So, while the MJO may work to suppress convection in the Gulf later next week a KW may counter act that with the convectively active phase (blue lines) moving across the Gulf. The image below is KW superimposed over the MJO. Notice how the suppressed phase of both the MJO and KW are working against 96L today but 97L will move across the convectively active phase of the KW this week: