Tropical Storm Idalia remains a high-end tropical storm, near the western tip of Cuba, with winds remaining at 70 mph according to the 2 a.m. advisory from the National Hurricane Center. Idalia will continue to strengthen over the next 48 hours and is forecast to become a major hurricane before making landfall by midweek.
The center of Idalia is located to the north of the western tip of Cuba, over the Gulf of Mexico.
Despite wind shear, Idalia will increase strength to a likely major hurricane by the middle of the week, just before landfall in the Florida Big Bend area or eastern Panhandle.
The National Weather Service has an active Tropical Storm Warning for all of Desoto, Charlotte, Lee and Coastal Collier counties. Inland Collier County is under a tropical storm watch.
While the center of the hurricane will stay west of us in Southwest Florida, we have to think about impacts instead of where the center will go. If the track shifts on the western edge of the cone, our impacts lessen, to the east and our impacts will get worse. Such as higher winds, heavier rain and more surge into SWFL. However, our forecast over the last few days has been on track.
Coastal areas have the potential to see 40-60 mph winds as the storm makes its closest pass to SWFL, which will be late Tuesday into Wednesday. Tropical Storm force winds, 40+mph, will work into SWFL as early as tomorrow morning, especially for communities west of U.S.41.
The winds from Idalia will push gulf waters along with it on the eastern side, which is why a storm surge watch is in effect for coastal Charlotte, Lee and Collier Counties.
While this graphic shows the worst-case scenario, some areas along our coastline could see a surge upwards of 2-4 feet in some of the low-lying coastal areas. The tide times will determine when we will see our highest water levels on both Tuesday and Wednesday.
We can also expect to get some much-needed rain this week, with some northern, coastal locations getting 4″ to 6″ of rain, which would put a nice dent in the drought we have going on in Southwest Florida. Some of those outer bands of Idalia working in later tonight and lasting into Thursday. The heaviest bands will move in Tuesday evening. Within those rain bands, we can’t rule out a few spin-up tornadoes heading into Wednesday.
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