Tropical Storm Rick: Flooding rains and gusty winds due near Mazatlan on Wednesday

October 20, 3:39 PMSan Jose Weather ExaminerRob Mayeda

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TROPICAL STORM RICK UPDATE:

While Rick's central pressure and wind speeds didn't change much on Tuesday, a disturbing trend in the satellite imagery reveals deep layer convection has blossomed along the northern and eastern sides of the low level center of circulation.

Cooling cloud top temperatures have remained fairly consistent in the N/NE quadrant of the tropical system and should these features hold together around landfall, the potential for flash flooding/mudslides looks fairly certain.

Computer model output shows rainfall estimates in ranging from 6" to as much as 16" inches of rain in some of the higher terrain, locally heavier amounts are certainly possible with the limiting factor being Rick's forward speed.  Should the storm maintain a slower pace, rainfall totals in the west/southwest facing mountains could be extreme.

The latest on Tropical Storm Rick

Sustained Winds: 65 mph

Moving: NE 14 mph

Estimated Central Pressure: 990 mb

Rick is expected to stay just south of Cabo San Lucas and southern Baja California before reaching the coastline of Western Mexico on Wednesday.  The projected path of the storm looks like a direct move towards Mazatlan by midday Wednesday.

It is also interesting to note that a couple of the models including the GFDL show wind gusts and a very slight intensification of Rick just before landfall to near hurricane force sustained wind speeds.  At present, the consensus forecast calls for Rick to remain at tropical storm status prior to landfall and rapid weakening as the storm center moves inland.

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