JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — This blog is written & updated weekly by *me* - Mike Buresh. The next “Buresh Blog” update will be the week of Oct. 26th. See & read updates every day at “Talking the Tropics With Mike”.
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Hurricane Isaias broke the streak of a “quiet” Atlantic hurricane season as well as the streak of zero U.S. hurricane landfalls - the last one was “Milton” in 2024.
Isaias found that dreaded “sweet spot” during an Atlantic season that had been very meager. Isaias formed in an area over the Western Gulf with relatively low shear, very warm water temps., a pulse in the MJO (Madden-Julian Oscillation) & - for a while - moved in sync with the wind shear - all added up to a Cat. 3 hurricane for a time. Upon approach to the coast - between Pensacola & Destin in the Western Fl. Panhandle - the very strong west to east wind shear + nearby dry air + friction from land dropped Isaias to a Cat. 2 at landfall but still produced a good deal of damage & flooding. Action News Jax was the only local media at landfall as Madison Foglio reported from Pensacola before, during & after the storm.
The image (Cooperative Institute for Meteorological Studies/CIMS) below is from Oct. 7th & shows the very warm water (80s to near 90) in addition to the strong wind shear over northern parts of the Gulf:
Forecast models overall did a decent job with AI leading the charge. So far... AI models haven’t been particularly good on tropical cyclone genesis but did do well with Isaias & its formation. Keep in mind AI is a learning model & is relatively new - especially for weather forecast models. So one would expect AI forecast models to improve with a larger, longer learning curve. Still - no two weather systems are the same, so I suspect good ol’ Mother Nature will still have the upper hand more often than not. I doubt weather forecasting will ever be 100% accurate. It should be pointed out that the traditional American GFS model actually did pretty well with Isaias - sniffing out the potential development many days in advance. The European physics model on the other hand, had its problems & was late to picking up on the development then when it did sniff out Isaias, it was too weak & too far west. The bend to the north was caused by a strong upper level ridge of high pressure near & east of Florida while a weak upper level trough was over the far Northwest Gulf. The two combined to develop an alleyway from the Western Gulf to the Western Florida Panhandle.
Track verification graph for Isaias - Google DM & human forecasters at the National Hurricane Center did quite well:
The images below are from early Friday, Oct. 9th just hours before landfall. Google DeepMind actually ended up a bit too far east while the physics-based models were generally too far west.
Madison Foglio & videographer Thomas Johnson in Pensacola during Isaias:
#firstalertwx power flashes in Pensacola as Isaias nears landfall to the immediate east near Destin @ActionNewsJax @WOKVNews - from @madisonfoglio pic.twitter.com/zvTDmGD1WO
— Mike Buresh (@MikeFirstAlert) October 10, 2026
After Isaias:
#firstalertwx #isaias @madisonfoglio on the ground in Pensacola Saturday - with videographer Thomas Johnson - some of the aftermath of Hurricane Isaias @ActionNewsJax @WOKVNews pic.twitter.com/CD74C1J2YC
— Mike Buresh (@MikeFirstAlert) October 10, 2026
Despite strong Isaias the ACE - Accumulated Cyclone Energy - index is still in the top 5 of lowest on record through Oct. 10th going back to 1851:
On the other hand, the Pacific remains the very active basin as was expected due the ongoing strong El Nino which I’ve blogged about frequently this year.
Isaias was only partially responsible for the very wet start to October for NE Florida & SE Georgia. A good deal of the first week of rain during the month was caused by a slow moving cold front followed by brisk onshore winds out of the east & northeast (local nor’easter). As of Oct. 14th... Jacksonville had already officially experienced its 9th wettest October on record... with more than 2 weeks still to go. And some areas are already at 15-20″ for the month! For the year, JIA now has a surplus for the first time.
And all the recent rain + cooler temps. has snakes on the move! I encountered this “beefy” cottonmouth in the evening
- Genus: Agkistrodon (derived from Greek words meaning “fishhook,” referring to its curved fangs)
- Species: piscivorus (derived from Latin words meaning “fish-eater”)
