Paul’s Low Headed Back to Gulf of Carpentaria

The Australian Bureau of Meteorology (ABM) continues to monitor the low pressure system that was tropical storm Paul. The ABM issued an update on Paul’s low at 4:56 p.m. CST local time (3:26 UTC), Wednesday, March 31, which would be 11:26 p.m. on March 30 for U.S. Eastern Daylight Time (the U.S. East coast is 14 1/2 hours behind Darwin, Australia’s time). Paul’s center was still over land on March 31 but is forecast to move into the southwestern Gulf of Carpentaria on April 1.

As a result, there is now a cyclone Watch in effect for coastal and island communities from Cape Shield to the Northern Territory/Queensland border, including Groote Eylandt. The Cyclone Watch from Nhulunbuy to Cape Shield was cancelled. However, there is a Severe Weather Warning for damaging wind gusts and heavy rainfall in the Roper-McArthur and Arnhem Districts.

TRMM captured a satellite image of Paul’s rainfall on March 30 at 1707 UTC (1:07 p.m. EDT). At that time, Paul’s rainfall was mostly light to moderate (between 20 and 40 millimeters or .78 to 1.57 inches per hour) over land and the isolated areas of heavy rain (as much as 2 inches per hour) were confined over the waters of the Gulf of Carpentaria.