All eyes on Gulf as system aims for coastline

The National Hurricane Center in Miami reported Monday that a concentrated area of thunderstorm activity — known as Invest 91-L — had an 80 percent chance of becoming a tropical depression or storm and affect parts of Texas and western Louisiana by this morning.
Forecast models indicate that the system would stay on a northwest track moving toward the Texas coast and could bring heavy rain to western Louisiana.
Models have been fairly consistent with the track bringing it to the central Texas coast in between Houston and Corpus Christi.
Landfall looks to be some time today, with the one model bringing it on shore later in the day while a second model is a little faster with an early morning landfall.
Regardless of whether it develops into a tropical storm, as some models predict, or remains a wet tropical wave, as others anticipate, a threat of torrential rain and additional flash flooding/river flooding is in play for parts of Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and the Ozarks.
It is this tropical moisture that will impact the Acadiana area, keeping rain chances high through the first half of the work week.
Gusty winds to tropical storm-force, minor coastal flooding, rip currents also threats.
Acadiana is on the east — or the “messy” — side of the storm system and some models are predicting that this could be an asymmetrical storm with most of the activity taking place east of the center of circulation.
As a result, storm surge could be an issue for residents living along the coast, particularly in Cameron and Vermilion parishes, and a Coastal Flood Advisory has been issued until late Tuesday from Morgan City into Texas.
Tides could be running 3-5 feet higher than normal, which could lead to come coastal flooding.
A National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration buoy located about 210 miles south of the mouth of the Mississippi River, reported significant wave heights of 16 feet early Monday morning well northeast of the center of the disturbance.
Wind shear (winds changing with height) had lessened over the storm area since Sunday, and there was some indication in satellite images that convection was trying to wrap closer to the center.
If the system is eventually classified as a tropical storm by the NHC, it would be named Bill. This appeared to be the top-end scenario at press time Monday as the system will not have much time over the Gulf to develop before moving inland.
The disturbance will be steered by a dome of high pressure aloft over the Southeast U.S. and should move into coastal Texas sometime today or early Wednesday, at the latest.