Tropical Update: The tropics are beginning to get more active. Watching!

ncwxauthority

August 11, 2026 at 2:20:12 PM

🌀 Tropical Update: Good afternoon, everyone. I'm sure everyone is sick of working on this fine Tuesday, so as you take your scroll break from work, I thought you'd love to read my tropical update. In true fashion as we head toward the start of schools/colleges, the tropics are coming alive, and this year is no different. I am, and forecasters at the National Hurricane Center are monitoring two main areas for potential tropical development in the Atlantic Ocean and two areas in the Pacific Ocean, with one showing a potential threat to Hawaii.

In the Atlantic, we have an area of disturbed weather in the North Atlantic moving away from the United States that has a low chance 20% of some Tropical Development over the next 5-7 days, but does not pose any threat to NC!

Down in the Main Development Region of the Atlantic, we've had several tropical waves that are moving off Africa over the next 5-10 days, and some are trying to show signs of development. There is now a 70% from the National Hurricane Center that a Tropical Depression or Storm will develop in this area. There remains high wind shear and dry air, so it'll face an uphill battle as it moves generally westward across the Atlantic. Since the system has not even developed, let's take models with a grain of salt and not jump to too many conclusions, but the threat to North Carolina at this point is rather low. So there's no reason to worry at this point.

Image 2: Is a graphic I created to give you an idea how long it takes tropical systems to travel across the Atlantic Ocean (NOT A FORECAST), just an example. This location is 10-14 days away, and it may not even survive the trek across. There could be some enhanced moisture to parts of the Caribbean Islands which they very much need.

Over in the Pacific, there is an area of disturbed weather over 1k miles east southeast of the Hawaiian Islands that has a high chance of becoming a Tropical Depression or Storm. Interests in the Hawaiian Islands should closely

monitor the progress of this system.

I'll keep you posted all season long; nothing to worry about right now in NC!

Mountains

110°F

Raleigh area

CADEN NELSON

WHY DO WEATHER APPS CHANGE SO DRAMATICALLY

ncwxauthority

Feb 16, 2020

1 min read

Imagine seeing a snowflake icon on your weather app when you wake, then 1 hour later, it is gone. Why, when you look at your weather app, is it so dramatically different than your local news or weather page.

Here's the answer in the 21st century of the weather world, most phone weather apps are not edited by a human they are just taken based on one model. There are many bad things to these models run on average every 6 hours one model run could have a significant snowstorm while another will have nothing. When your phone app pulls the data, it sees that and, without looking at weather data or other models, it inputs that into the forecast.

Human Edited Forecasts: When you see your local news, read the National Weather Service, and or read my personal forecast, you see a human-made forecast with knowledge of the local area. Most news stations and weather pages, For example, North Carolina's Weather Authority and WRAL (just two examples), we all take data from the main weather models European, GFS, NAM, and CMC. Create a weather forecast based on that, and it's ensembles and the climatology of the area. From here, we can watch trends in the models, and only provide the most accurate information, not changing every hour.

Bottom Line: Your phone apps such as The Weather Channel or just the built-in iPhone app is not reliable. So if you see a snow icon don't get your hopes up until the human edited forecasts start to show that.

Stay with North Carolina's Weather Authority for hype-free accurate weather forecasting.