Area being watched closely for tropical development in Atlantic
The quiet time for Atlantic may not last much longer as an area of interest may soon challenge the break. The next tropical storm will be named Dexter.
Meteorologist Tony Laubach speaks with experts regarding tips for how to prep your home ahead of the next hurricane.
The period from late July to the start of August is typically quiet compared to what often transpires in the tropics as August progresses into September. Waters continue to warm and are still a few weeks away from peak levels. However, in most areas from the coast of Africa to the surrounding Gulf and southwestern Atlantic, water temperatures are at or above the critical 80-degree-Fahrenheit level that supports tropical development.
In recent weeks, there have been vast areas of dry air and dust pushing westward from the Sahara Desert in Africa. Disruptive breezes (wind shear) have overlapped and extended into more tranquil wind zones for the most part.
Along the southeastern United States coast, there have been a few attempts at tropical development in recent weeks following Tropical Storm Chantal. The third tropical storm of the season moved ashore in North Carolina around the Independence Day holiday with torrential rain and flooding. However, no named storm has developed since.
"In the coming days, we will be watching the zone from northeast of Florida to just off the Carolina coast for tropical development," AccuWeather Lead Hurricane Expert Alex DaSilva said.
Initially, this area, as well as farther west over the interior of the Carolinas, Georgia, northern Florida and southern Alabama, will be quite active in terms of drenching showers and gusty thunderstorms from this weekend to early next week. This will be due to the presence of Atlantic and Gulf moisture, of course, but also due to a front that will dip southward and stall nearby.
Fronts that stall near the warm waters of the southwestern Atlantic sometimes can slowly brew a tropical storm or a storm that forms along the front and becomes tropical over time. The latter tends to have much greater wind potential than a non-tropical storm and can go on to become a powerful hurricane.
"Roughly from Saturday, Aug. 2, to Tuesday, Aug. 5, is the time frame for a tropical storm to develop just off the U.S. southern Atlantic coast," DaSilva said.
Steering breezes would likely guide that storm farther away from the U.S. later next week but possibly near Bermuda, so the concern does not end with the U.S.
Dangerous flash flooding may ensue
Regardless, tropical moisture that interacts with the stalled front and low pressure associated with a brewing storm is likely to unleash torrential downpours along the southern Atlantic coast to the northeastern Gulf coast from this weekend to early next week.
In areas that receive these downpours repeatedly day after day, the threat for flash flooding will grow and increase, AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Dan Pydynowski said.
"An area of particular concern could be southeastern Georgia and coastal South Carolina where these downpours may be quite persistent," Pydynowski explained. "A general 4-8 inches of rain could fall over this area over the course of several days, causing street and highway flooding in low-lying areas around cities such as Savannah, Georgia and Charleston, South Carolina."
The AccuWeather Local StormMax™ rainfall is a whopping 12 inches for this setup.
Those with beach plans should be mindful of locally rough surf, thunderstorm downpours and the risk of brief tornadoes and waterspouts.
"Travel could be slow through the weekend on major roadways such as interstates 10, 20, 75 and 95 and those with vacation plans to head to beaches such as Hilton Head, North Carolina, and St. Simons Island, Georgia, may face a soggy weekend," Pydynowski warned.
Some of the storms that erupt from Friday afternoon to Friday night will be severe in the Southeast states.
Thousands of miles to the southeast is a loose group of clouds and showers heading toward the Lesser Antilles. This is associated with what meteorologists call a tropical wave, a weak, westward-moving area of low pressure. Under the right conditions with a moist atmosphere and low wind shear, tropical waves can evolve into full-fledged tropical rainstorms, tropical storms and hurricanes.
While there is no longer an immediate risk for tropical development with this tropical wave, it may bring some robust downpours and thunderstorms from the Leeward Islands to Puerto Rico early next week.
As August progresses, tropical waves moving westward from Africa represent the backbone of the hurricane season, which lasts through September and into the first part of October.
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