July 12, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Our photo of the day is from Doug Hubatsch and shows a gorgeous sunset between Palmetto Bay and Crawfish Rock. This morning we have fewer showers around than we did yesterday, but those few have given West Bay a little rain. Rain chances will continue, especially for Sunday night into Monday.

On satellite you can see clouds that have moved over West Bay moving out to sea, but to our east at 7 a.m. you can see a storm cloud that looks like it is about to cross the western part of the island. We will keep a small chance of rain through the morning hours, but from about 10 a.m. into the afternoon we should be partly cloudy with east winds 10-15 mph and seas 3 feet south side.
We will continue to have overnight and morning chances of rain tonight and tomorrow, but I think the chance will be a little higher Sunday night into Monday and rain may linger a little longer on Monday.
Winds tomorrow will be similar to today, but will be a bit calmer Sunday with east winds 7-12 mph and seas around 2 feet south side. Monday looks quite calm with east winds 5-10 mph and seas 1 foot.

A calmer weekend like this one calls out for a beach barbecue and there is absolutely one place on the island to get the meat for the barbecue — well, OK, two places, but that’s only because Carniceria Rosita has two locations, one in French Harbour and one in Coxen Hole.

Tides continue to be mild. Have a great Friday!

July 11, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Our Photo of the Day comes from Ryan Sarge and shows Capt. Wagner feeding the pelican Capt. Hubert. Evidently Hubert has learned that the ticket to free food is entertaining the tourists on Utila. Utila is one of the few places that has stayed mostly dry this morning. The rest of us have had a nice thundershower, making at least three mornings in a row of rain for many of us.

On satellite we can see the storm moving from the coast, over the islands and to the north. It looks like it may move away from us in the 7 o’clock hour. After that we should have partly cloudy skies. We will continue to have these chances at morning showers until Sunday evening into Monday when a wave of tropical moisture will give us better chances for afternoon rains as well.

Guanaja also missed out on the fun this morning, but they got over 2 inches of rain yesterday.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We awake to east winds 10-15 mph and seas 3 feet south side. Winds and seas will stay around that speed through Saturday. Sunday and Monday are looking a little calmer.

Mitch Cummins will be at the Roatan Brewery Craft Market this Sunday. If you have any specific Roatan Pets needs for your canine, shoot him a message on Facebook or at +504 9801-7828.

Tides continue to be mild. Have a great Thursday!

July 10, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Our Photo of the Day comes from Joe Burne and is taken from Oakridge, looking out toward Pandy Town and Oakridge Cay. This morning we are dealing with a few showers especially on the east side that have brought an inch and a quarter of rain to Guanaja and about a tenth of an inch for Oakridge.

You can see a lot of rain to our east this morning. This satellite at 6:45 a.m. looks a lot like yesterday’s. The rains stuck around a little longer than usual before clearing out for the afternoon yesterday. We’ll see how long these can stick around this morning and if they can give us more morning rains but, again, we should clear out for the afternoon.

You may wonder why July gets wetter when March and April are so dry. Part of the reason is the Bermuda High, which you can clearly see in this forecast map of the Canadian model. The high pressure system creates the clockwise movement in the Atlantic off the US East Coast, roughly over the island of Bermuda and pushes moisture on its south side in a westward motion toward us. This doesn’t mean rain every day, but it keep the moisture coming and gives us a 30-40 percent chance of rain each morning.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We will continue to have east winds around 15-20 mph and seas 3-4 feet overnight and in the early mornings and 2-3 feet midday into the afternoon. These winds should continue until Monday. Much of next week looks a good bit calmer than this week.

Tides continue to be moderate. Have a great Wednesday!

July 9, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Today’s Photo of the Day comes from Brandi Conway and was taken from Infinity Bay. It shows cumulus clouds on the horizon at sunset. We had some morning cumulus clouds today bringing east side rains around 4 a.m. Those clouds should clear out and we should be mostly sunny and windy for the afternoon.

On the satellite from 4:30 to 6:30 a.m. you can see the rain clouds passing over the islands. You will also notice that the area around us was mostly clear, so we were quite fortunate.

Here’s the rainfall map. This will be the pattern this week. If we are fortunate we will get a morning shower, otherwise we will be partly cloudy to mostly sunny.

The recent rains have been beneficial for sea temperature. Our one working temperature buoy is on the north side near Big Bight and is now down to 29.1 degrees Celsius (84.4F). It is just over our normal hottest water temperature, but a full degree Celsius below where we were June 14 at 30.4C (86.7F). You will remember that last year we made it to 90 degree water and that was very bad for coral bleaching. We are now under the bleaching threshold. Let’s hope we stay there. Yesterday at the airport we only made it to 87F (30.5C) and even the heat index was under 100F (37.8C). If we can keep these morning showers around, it will keep our temps from getting too unbearable.

Yesterday we had a visitor on Jonesville Point, a macaw that had gotten away from its owner. Sherri Visker and Roatan Operation Animal Rescue were very helpful in knowing what to do. I don’t know where I would turn if they weren’t on the island. It’s a good reminder to reach out with support and a great way to support them is to buy Roatan Pets food, because 10 percent of their proceeds goes to ROAR.

High and low tides should be quite moderate today. Have a great Tuesday!

July 8, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Our Photo of the Day comes from Claire Staffa and a spectacular Luna Beach sunset. A couple of things surprised me yesterday. The Storm Behind Beryl completely fell apart and we didn’t get evening rains and the easterly trade winds returned yesterday afternoon. Those winds will last through the week and we do have some storms nearing Guanaja at 7 a.m.

On satellite we can see a complex of storms nearing Guanaja at 7 a.m. The Garcias on the south side of the big island of Guanaja have gotten .07 of an inch. These storms will give us some rain chances this morning, after which we should have partly cloudy skies. The rest of the week we will have about a 30 percent chance of rain each day, mostly in the mornings.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We awake to 20 mph winds and 4 foot seas on the south side of the east Roatan. Utila is calm this morning, but even Utila will get trade winds later today. Most of this week we will have east winds 15-25 mph and seas 3-4 feet south side.

Our Photo of the Month of July will win a roundtrip on Galaxy Wave to Guanaja. If you want to visit Guanaja for a weekend, now is the time to start planning. I think it is sad so many Roatanians have never been to our easternmost island. You owe it to yourself to visit an island that still retains a little more of the pre-tourist flavor of the Bay Islands.

Low tide is 4:30 p.m. Keep the folks in Houston dealing with Beryl in your thoughts and prayers. Have a great week!

Rainfall for June 2024

In all the excitement over Hurricane Beryl I almost forgot to post rainfall for next month. Thanks to Trish Symons for the reminder. Consistency is important in recording rainfall, so I’m continuing to use the rainfall total in Sandy Bay, though some other locations got more rain toward the end of June. We’re officially recording .94 of an inch, continuing the drought that plagued us with less than two inches through four months. Locations on the east end generally got 2-3 inches of rain.

We’re already doing better in July with over 2 inches recorded this week. July is typically our wettest month outside of rainy season and, while we don’t have big storms on the horizon, persistent chances of scattered showers remain in the forecast, so I am hopeful we will get over 5 inches this month.

July 7, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Our Photo of the Day comes from Elizabeth Leiva on Lucy Point and shows some of the cumulus clouds that have brought us rain the past few days. We are dealing with some rain this morning and have a chance for more this evening, though as we get into next week we should start seeing less rain.

Don’t forget the five photos with the most likes in the Facebook group will compete for a free Galaxy Wave round trip to Guanaja.

Most of us have gotten some rain since midnight on top of what we got yesterday. The big winner today is West Bay which was getting a shower with over an inch of rain as I was writing this around 6:45 a.m.

Here is the 6:45 a.m. satellite. The clouds are moving west/southwest, so it looks like most of us should start clearing out for the morning, though a chance of showers persists.

I drew an arrow to the core of The Storm Behind Beryl, which never amounted to anything more than scattered storms. The GFS thinks that even that will fall apart, but if it holds together, it should give us some rain this evening. After that, as we look to next week, we will have mostly 30 percent chances of rain, mostly in the morning times and lots of sun and heat.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We have one more day of quite calm conditions with east winds 7-12 mph and seas 1-2 feet. Tomorrow and Tuesday we are back to east winds 20-25 mph and seas 3-4 feet south side.

If it’s Sunday it must be Lobster Day at Ikigai by Robby Molina. And don’t forget Ikigai is one of the few gourmet restaurants on the island to be open on Mondays as well.

Lowest tide is 3:50 p.m. Have a great Sunday!

July 6, 2024

After Beryl has passed well into the Gulf of Mexico, we are ready to start our photo contest for the month of July, with a free round-trip on the Galaxy Wave to Guanaja as the prize. We start with an appropriate rainbow taken by Mirka Štekláčová from Czech Village looking to the south of Oakridge. We’ve had a few showers around this morning, but those should decrease as we get toward midday and we will have quite calm conditions this weekend. Chances of rain are pretty good tomorrow and next week looks drier, with easterly trade winds picking up. More in comments.
As you can see on satellite, we have a dying storm moving in from the east, so this morning there will be a small chance of a shower. Our weather is humid and unsettled, so this afternoon into tonight there is a 40 percent chance of rain. Tomorrow there will be a scattered showers as our Storm Behind Beryl moves in. I would say we have a good chance at another inch of rain around the island, especially tomorrow.

This morning Sandy Bay picked up around a quarter of an inch.

I labeled the little storm cloud that brought rain to Sandy Bay this morning. There is a large mass of clouds to our east, but the part closest to us doesn’t have much rain in it, but to the east there is still a nice thunderstorm. We will see if it can stay alive long enough to make it here in a few hours.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: This will be a very calm weekend, with east/northeast winds 5-10 mph and seas 1-2 feet, more toward 1 foot tomorrow, so if you’re willing to dodge a few showers, a great weekend to be on the sea. Starting Monday we will pick up our 15-20 mph east winds again, with 3-4 foot seas south side.

Low tide is 3:10 p.m. Have a great weekend!

July 5, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. Hurricane Beryl moved a little north of predictions and hit the island of Cozumel dead on. It had around 115 mph winds when it hit there, and is now entering the mainland of Yucatan at 100 mph. It is expected to emerge into the Gulf of Mexico and threaten Deep South Texas. As for us, all of us got a little rain out of Beryl, mostly just under an inch, though Sandy Bay got around 2 inches. Winds and seas should calm today through the weekend. There is a storm popping up north of Utila. We’ll see if it grows, but right now we’ll keep a small chance of rain through the morning, mostly dry this afternoon through tomorrow, and we hope the Storm Behind Beryl brings us Sunday afternoon rains.

Here are the rainfall totals. Guanaja and Utila have been dry this morning, but they got in on the fun yesterday.

Wind and Galaxy Wave forecast: We start the morning with northwest winds 10-15 mph and seas 4 feet north side. Winds will get quite calm by midday, though seas on the north side will stay choppy, around 3 feet most of today. The weekend looks quite calm for both wind and sea. Easterly trade winds return Monday into next week.

Here is the Storm Behind Beryl. The NOAA NWS National Hurricane Center has dropped any expectation it will turn into a tropical storm, but it still brings us hope for rain, especially Sunday afternoon and Sunday night.

Many thanks to all who have contributed at buymeacoffee.com/roatan and patreon.com/roatanweather, but thanks especially for the kind comments. We try to give an honest forecast without being too extreme either way. Weather is never certain, but there are things that are likely and things that are unlikely and during this hurricane season we want to be prepared. If you buy meat at Carniceria Rosita or dine at Ikigai or take a Jolly Roger excursion or ride the Galaxy Wave or buy your pet Roatan Pets food, let them know you heard about them here.

Low tide is 2:30 p.m. Have a great Friday.


July 4, 2024

Good morning Bay Islands. you would be forgiven for thinking that the storm you are looking at is three storms. This is the degradation of Hurricane Beryl due to shear that we’ve been talking about all week. The actual center of the storm is the part southwest of George Town, Grand Cayman and according to the NOAA NWS National Hurricane Center it is still packing winds of 120 mph, making it a Category 3 hurricane. It is pushing some moisture in front of it, though it doesn’t have classic hurricane bands. This will give us a chance of showers throughout today into tonight. Roatan Weather supporter Megan Mitchell sent me a text yesterday about how the calm before the storm is a real thing. We have that this morning. Outside my window on the south side things look flat calm. Winds should get up to 10-15 mph from the west later today and north side seas getting up to 6 feet tomorrow morning.

Many of us got a third of an inch from a storm that passed through around 1 a.m. I hope we get some more rain out of Beryl, but most of the models doubt we will get more than an inch more rain, if that much.

This morning’s path for Hurricane Beryl is what we’ve been expected the past several day. It should weaken to probably a Category 1 before striking south of Cancun in Yucatan. Our best chances of rain will come late evening and overnight.

Friday winds and seas will calm throughout the day and winds will turn back to the east. Saturday and Sunday look quite calm.

Our storm behind Beryl is still unlikely to form into anything, but could give us a better chance of showers, especially Sunday afternoon into Monday morning.

Many cruise ships were rerouted this week, but next week looks like business as usual, with nothing in the tropics to worry about. If you are planning your cruise excursions next week, check out those offered by Jolly Roger Roatan.

Low tide is 2 p.m. Have a great Thursday.