First edition 615 on the clock in our studios wearing orange. You're gonna find out why in a few minutes, Barbie's got a special interview with a very special lady. I do. I'm excited. I see her over off six. She's waiting. Yeah, so exciting there. Uh We are watching the tropics very closely. I've been saying it's, it's just close, close enough to be a little alert, but just far away enough where we're not gonna see too much activity from the system right now. Here is a look outside uh where we are dealing with a little bit of wind out there. The flag is not up on the flagpole this morning. It is 78 degrees. The wind is on the north at 16 MPH. Our visibility is at 10 miles. So we're in good shape. There are some pockets of, of le uh light rainfall falling here or there that will lead to a little bit of a drop in visibility but not too bad. So we're tracking tropical storm. Fancy confidence is growing on those hurricane strength wind speeds possible in the Gulf of Mexico. We now have an 80% chance of hurricane strength winds, especially right through the center of this forecast cone. So confidence is growing, that Francine will become a hurricane that could happen. Uh Later on this afternoon, we could have a hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico. That would be about 100 and 50 to 250 miles offshore from the coastline of Corpus Christi as that happens so close but not quite right. Uh But it is going to be enough to cause some conditions that will be a little rough, especially out at sea. So here's a look at some of our, our buoy readings. When it comes to our wind speeds. This morning, we've got some gusts out just offshore of Corpus Christi at about 27 MPH, 27 MPH looks to be the main gus. We don't have a buoy close to the center of circulation associated with Francine, but the hurricane hunters picking up 65 mile per hour wind speeds there through the center of the storm. Now, as Francine continues to move across the Gulf, it is expected to strengthen to a category two hurricane before landfall there into Louisiana. We could see some winds offshore around 30 to 40 possibly 45 MPH. So tropical storm force conditions expected well offshore of the Texas coastline, but we are not into dissipating much in the way at all in terms of strong winds here in Corpus Christi locally or across the coastal bend. This wind speed forecast is for Port Aransas north northeast winds throughout the day. We could have some gusts closer to 35 MPH, but overall winds sustained there around 20 to 22 MPH throughout the day. So it will be some strong winds that will create a really strong down wind or down coast current or down shore wind and that could lead to a little bit of a push on shore with our wave action and wave heights and so forth. Uh But overall, the tropical storm force conditions expected well out in the water closer to 70 nautical miles or more offshore. Uh But then we have a tropical storm watch right along our coastline just to be a little extra cautious. And then the trop or the coastal flood warning is until 1 p.m. on Thursday. And that's really my biggest concern is surf and then the chance for some coastal flooding right now, we're looking at inundation around 2 ft at most which does lead to some minor flooding for the potential of some businesses homes right along the coastline elsewhere. Uh Not too bad of a flooding condition but beach conditions are going to be rough. We are expecting the really high rip current risk with those wave heights 5 to 7 ft out there, wave periods 8 to 9 seconds the next two days, then those wave he slower pretty quickly into the weekend. So one of the reason this storm is a little bit lopsided right now is we've got a lot of conviction associated with this stationary boundary that's still hanging out in the gulf. There is going to be a little bit of a push to get that boundary moving north and allow Francine to also move northeast with a wheat trough that makes its way across Texas and then kind of merges with Francine to help continue to push it to the northeast. High pressure sets up over the Gulf of Mexico. We start to see onshore flow, lot of humidity, a low chance of rain returning for next weekend. However, with Francine staying well off our coastline, our rain chances are, are getting smaller and smaller. We're talking just around 1/10 of an inch to an inch for areas right along the coastline. But Kennedy County still has the greatest risk for 1 to 3 inches of rainfall. You'll see here, temperatures warming into the weekend. We'll be back in the nineties. Oh, yeah. And our humidity is back as well. Barbie John Thomas, of course it is.