Gustav Aborning?

Today we're catching T.S. Fay's backside. There's more wind and rain than we've seen all week in the Pensacola area. Still, as a rather crabby 'deep background' source of Pensacola radio personality/ self-proclaimed "Christian" Kenneth Lamb says of Fay when it was a tropical storm, what we're seeing today is not much more that what we -

see anytime in summer from a slow moving thunderstorm and a squall line passing through. It is not any kind of extraordinary occurrence.

The bad news is that it looks like another tropical event is about to be born: Tropical Depression 7. We'd guess it will soon be renamed "Gustav" -- an ominous, unyielding name if ever we've heard one.

Says the NHC's first discussion:

We are initiating advisories on Tropical Depression Seven. There is an unusually large spread to our track model guidance that seems to be the result of two primary scenarios for the future motion of the system. One would be a generally northward track into a weakness in the subtropical ridge over the western Atlantic... and this is depicted by the NOGAPS and ECMWF solutions. A second scenario is for the tropical cyclone to bend more westward in response to a mid-level anticyclone over Florida... and that is depicted by the BAM tracks... the HWRF... and the GFDL. Our first official track forecast somewhat splits the difference but leans toward the latter scenario. However it should be noted that the confidence in this track forecast is not high....

Below is a graphic showing what the NHC forecast models are projecting early this afternoon. Remember, things are at a very early stage. A lot can happen over the next week, some of it -- like the GFDL model -- likely bad for Pensacola Beach. Some of it okay for us.

Stay tuned -- and don't be lulled into complacency just because the NHC blew it last weekend. They get more right than wrong.