To quote Ed Piotrowski:
FRIDAY 6PM HURRICANE DORIAN UPDATE
Over the past 24 hours, the odds of Dorian having a direct impact on our area have increased. High pressure is expected to break down early next week and leave Dorian in weak steering currents. That makes it very difficult to determine when and where the turn north will occur. As you well know, exactly where Dorian turns is critical to what impacts we see here. That turn doesn't occur until late Monday or Tuesday! Quite frankly, 50-100 miles one way or the other will make a huge difference in what impacts we could get. I simply can't tell you 5-6 days from now exactly where Dorian will track therefore I can't tell you precisely who could get what. I hope things become clearer by late this weekend. I am confident that any impacts here would most likely be Thursday and/or Friday.
SCENARIO #1 - This is the most likely scenario and its odds have increased a bit. Dorian would make landfall in Florida and stay mostly over land as it moves north then northeast. That would weaken it quickly so that by the time it came through here, we wouldn't have huge wind impacts as we did with hurricane Matthew. Our biggest threat would be the potential for heavy rainfall that could lead to flooding. While I don't see anything close to the rain some areas received with Hurricane Florence, flooding would be possible. Of course with any track inland, there would be a tornado threat. Storm surge flooding would occur along the coast but it would be minimal. Odds of this happening have remained the same at 45%.
SCENARIO #2 - This is almost guaranteed not to happen. If high pressure remains strong, it would keep Dorian on a more westerly track for a longer amount of time before it turned north. It would track so far to the west of us that we'd have virtually no impacts here. Odds of this happening are down to 5%.
SCENARIO #3 - This is the worst-case scenario. If Dorian turns before reaching the Florida coast, it would stay over warm waters that would likely keep it a strong hurricane headed toward the Carolina coast. Obviously, this would bring huge impacts including heavy, flooding rain, high wind, a tornado threat, and a significant storm surge. The odds of this happening have increased slightly to 25%.
SCENARIO #4 - This is the scenario everyone wants! If high pressure breaks down more quickly and a trough is able to dive far enough south, it could scoop up Dorian and keep it far enough from the coast to prevent and significant impacts. The odds of this happening are up slightly to 25%.
These numbers will be slow to change and will be based on trends in the models and their ensembles over the coming days. One piece of advice if you look at models online: They change every six hours and often swing one way or the other wildly. Don't get freaked out or let your guard down because of ONE model run.
Once again, if we are going to see any impacts around here, it won't be until Thursday or Friday of next week so you have nothing to worry about through the weekend. The only thing you need to do is keep an eye on it and have your hurricane plan together, just in case.
I'll have another update Saturday morning by 11am