Tropical Storm Helene is quickly organizing tonight, set to enter the Gulf of Mexico over the next 24 hours and make landfall (likely) across Florida late Thursday. This evening, Helene is still a Tropical Storm with max sustained winds of 60 mph. Visually, the satellite presentation has improved with signs of deep convection now co-located overtop the low level center. This is a critical necessity for future development, of which could be quite significant in the coming 48 hours. Helene is within a generally favorable environment of mid 80s water temperatures, relatively limited wind shear & upper level support. All the while, there won't be much land interaction to halt the process of intensifying. Once it enters the Gulf, it's a clear runway up until landfall. A quick pace appears the be the only thing that could limit how strong Helene could get. The National Hurricane Center suggests Helene will be able to become a CAT 3 hurricane before landfall near the Big Bend region of Florida late Thursday. That fits reasonably well within model guidance, although there are still pathways to a high/lower peak. Our main focus here in WNY is the inland track of the leftovers. That's where things get interesting. A strong upper level low diving southward will interact with Helene in a phenomenon we call the Fujiwhara Effect. Seemingly drawn together like magnets, when two areas of low pressure (in this case a hurricane & upper low) get close to one another, they begin to rotate around a common center. Sometimes, the stronger low and cause the weeker low to slingshot away, other times the larger low absorbs the smaller one. The latter appears most likely in this case with the remnants of Helene merging with this energy. Models are having a difficult time discerning how that will all play out as these features sort of drift around to our southwest into the weekend. While this is happening, high pressure nearby will try to keep rain from this feature out of WNY. Most guidance right now suggests that high pressure will be successful in doing so. Indeed, I'd suggest that is the most likely outcome. Still, at least some cloud cover could try and sneak into a weekend that would otherwise have been mainly sunny. So many moving parts with this, this has the feel of a forecast likely to undergo some changes in time. We'll keep you posted.