TROPICAL UPDATE: Matthew Still a Powerful Category 4 Hurricane; Still too Early to Know if U.S. will be Impacted

As of the 11:00PM EDT advisory Matthew was located at 14.7 degrees north and 75.0  degrees west. Maximum sustained winds were 145 miles per-hour, pressure was 943 millibars, and movement was to the north at 5 miles per-hour.

Matthew’s 145 mile per-hour sustained winds make it a high end category 4 hurricane.

Short-term forecast track [through Tuesday]

Nothing has changed regarding Matthew’s short-term forecast track since our previous update.

Matthew will continue to move north over the next 48 hours, making landfall Haiti tomorrow, and Eastern Cuba Tuesday.

Late Tuesday Matthew move into the Bahamas, likely make a turn towards the northwest or north-northwest [see .

Short-term intensity forecast [through Tuesday]

Unfortunately, Matthew is no longer expected to weaken [other than typical minor fluctuation in intensity] prior to landfall in Haiti and East Cuba as we stated in our previous update. Instead, Matthew will likely maintain its current intensity, or possibly rapidly intensify again, over the next 24 – 36 hours.

Presently the National Hurricane Center [NHC] forecast, as of 11:00PM EDT , is for Matthew to make landfall in Haiti and Cuba as a high end, extremely dangerous category 4 hurricane with winds of 140 miles per-hour.

Late Tuesday Matthew will weaken some due to land interaction with Haiti and Cuba.

Matthew will likely weaken Tuesday, and the NHC forecasts Matthew to weaken to a category 3 hurricane Tuesday.

Beyond Tuesday

Beyond Tuesday details regarding Matthew’s track and intensity remain uncertain; therefore, we still don’t know if Matthew will impact the United States.

However, at this time it looks like Matthew will move east of Florida, as a category 2 -3 hurricane, and likely won’t make landfall in – or directly impact – Florida; both can’t be ruled out yet, but the chances are low at this time.

Since Matthew likely won’t directly impact or make landfall Florida, this will be our last update on Matthew.

If Matthew’s chances of directly impacting Florida or making landfall in Florida go up, we will begin issuing updates on Matthew again. 

Caleb Carmichael
Caleb Carmichael

Caleb is the owner of Gulf Coast Storm Center. He is currently an undergraduate student at Mississippi State University majoring in geoscience with a concentration in broadcast and operational meteorology. While not yet a meteorologist, Caleb has been providing weather updates, news, and analysis for the Gulf Coast since 2014.

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