Irma remains a monster as it tears through the Carribbean

Remains a powerful category 5 storm

ROANOKE, Va. – Irma has already made a couple of landfalls in the tiny islands of the Leeward Islands. Barbuda, St. Martin and Anguilla have all taken direct hits from the 185 mph storm.

The satellite image below shows the islands of Anguilla and St. Martin swallowed up by Irma's eye. 

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The folks there would have been able to see sunshine and feel the winds go calm for a short time before being blasted with 185 mph winds again, The strongest part of a hurricane is the eyewall, the immediate part surrounding the eye. Major devastation has already been reported.

Hurricane hunters have been sampling Irma and the environment around it to continue to provide computer forecast models the best possible data so meteorologists can zero in on where Irma is headed. Along with this, extra weather balloon launches are being done in the United States to sample a dip in the jet stream to project how much of an effect it will have on steering Irma.

Every piece that is labeled in the picture below has some kind of role in steering Irma.

Tuesday night, computer forecasts started to trend a little further east with the track. Now the computers have been all over the place with Irma, but with all of this extra data, computers may be on to something. It is important to know why this shift could be happening.

One of the reasons for the shift is the dip in the jet appears to be a stronger and moving further south. Tropical Storm Jose may also be weakening the Bermuda high behind Irma. A weaker Bermuda High would help to start pulling Irma to the north.

As of 11 a.m on Wednesday, The National Hurricane Center put out this forecast which shows a strong Category 4 storm making landfall in south Florida and then riding the east coast. Everyone from Florida to the Mid-Atlantic need to be paying attention as there are a lot of changing factors. Locally, southwest and Central Virginia could receive some rain. How much depends upon the exact track the storm takes. Stay tuned.