On The Radar with Jess

Coastal Concerns for the First Coast this Weekend and New Atlantic Area to Watch

Jessica Arnoldy Jessica Arnoldy


While we are still keeping an eye on the Atlantic Basin, there's currently only one area being monitored by the NHC and it has a long way to go before it would even come close to US impacts:

Image 23  

For much of this week, parts of the First Coast experienced minor coastal flooding thanks to persistent, onshore northeast winds that gusted over 30 mph. In the below videos, you can see the rough surf and minor coastal flooding that occurred. 

 

Similar conditions will return late this week and linger through the weekend, leading to an increase in rip current risks and some minor coastal flooding. The culprit is a weak trough of low pressure that will hang out off the Southeast coast coupled with a strong high pressure to the north. The gradient between these two entities will increase onshore winds again through the weekend, with wind gusts 20 - 30+ mph possible:

Image 24

Be sure to check your local NWS for updated rip current forecasts through the weekend. For example, click on the below picture to get the most update forecast for the Jacksonville area:

 
Be sure to know the different beach flags and what they indicate before you head to the beach this weekend. As you can see from the Weatherstem camera at the Jacksonville Beach on Thursday, red flags are flying indicating extreme caution should be taken before entering the water:

Image 25

 

 

Want to learn more about coastal hazards, including rip current safety? Check out Weatherstem's learning module on these topics here: 
https://learn.weatherstem.com/modules/learn/lessons/109/index.html

 

Weatherstem

Real-time weather monitoring for the organizations that can't afford to guess.

Professional hardware, live HD camera, automated alerts, and software — installed and managed for you. 900+ stations deployed nationwide across emergency management, athletics, and commercial operations.

Book a Free Demo
Jessica Arnoldy, Director of Meteorology Services at Weatherstem
Jessica Arnoldy
Director, Content and Meteorology Services

Jessica brings nearly two decades of broadcast and operational meteorology experience to Weatherstem. She spent 19.5 years as a senior meteorologist at The Weather Channel and holds a BS from Georgia Tech and MS from Penn State. She writes On The Radar to help emergency managers, athletic directors, and operations teams understand what severe weather means for their specific situations.

Keep reading