I would keep a very close eye on Tropical Storm Ophelia.
She is moving now, after a long period of being stationary. The projected 3 -day path takes her along the Florida east coast with a 40-50% chance of tropical storm force winds (39+ mph) in the Disney area in the next couple of days.
After that, however, Ophelia becomes very problematic. The official five day path projects her to slow down, develop into a Category 1 hurricane early Sunday morning, turning right as she does so. And that's the good news.
The bad news is that hurricanes which do that usually do a 270 -- meaning they clock around from a northerly path, to the east, south, and the end up going west. We've had a number of those movements over the Bahamas in recent years, which brought the storms directly into South Florida.
The computer model guidance is just about evenly split beyond 3 days. Some models call for the hurricane to move out into the Atlantic, while others call for the storm to do a 270, gain strength to Cat 1, and then go right across Central Florida. One of the models which calls for that path is the only model which correctly predicted Katrina's path.
So I'd certainly stay tuned!
Official information can be found at
www.nhc.noaa.gov
