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News / Hurricane

Elsa set to charge right up the west coast of Florida

By Jessica Storm, AccuWeather Meteorologist

Updated Jul 6, 2021 3:17 PM EDT

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Tropical Storm Elsa emerged back over warm water late Monday after making landfall in Cuba earlier in the day, with its sights now set on the United States. A hurricane watch has been issued for portions of Florida, along with a slew of tropical storm warnings, and a state of emergency was in effect for parts of the Sunshine State ahead of the storm's projected United States landfall at midweek.

Satellite imagery showed the storm appearing a bit ragged after emerging off the northwestern coast of Cuba on Monday night, several days after it became a Category 1 hurricane in the eastern Caribbean. Still, meteorologists cautioned that Elsa was a dangerous storm.

AccuWeather has sent a team of reporters to Florida to cover the storm as it hits the state this week, including Bill Wadell in Key West, Emmy Victor in Fort Myers and Kim Leoffler in Tampa.

Elsa, which is predicted to impact Florida and portions of the Southeast as less than one on the AccuWeather RealImpact™ Scale for Hurricanes, is expected to make landfall north of Tampa, Florida, Wednesday morning. The storm made landfall over Cuba on Monday after leaving devastation behind and causing three fatalities across the Caribbean this past weekend.

As of 11 a.m. EDT Tuesday, Elsa was packing maximum sustained winds of 60 mph as the center was located about 65 miles west-northwest of Key West, Florida, and moving along to the north-northwest at 10 mph, much slower than its breakneck pace late last week. Tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 70 miles from its center.

Elsa's moisture began to overspread the Florida Keys on Monday night into Tuesday morning as tropical storm warnings remained in effect. The west coast of the Florida Peninsula, which includes Tampa Bay, is also under a tropical storm warning. A storm surge warning has also been issued for the west coast of Florida from Bonita Beach to the Aucilla River. This includes Tampa Bay.

Tropical storm watches included the Georgia coast and portions of the South Carolina coast by the National Hurricane Center. A tropical storm warning was in effect from the Florida Keys from Craig Key to the Dry Tortugas and along the Florida west coast from Flamingo to the Ochlockonee River. In addition, a hurricane watch was in effect for the west coast of Florida from Egmont Key to the Steinhatchee River.

Following its tour of Cuba, Elsa is forecast to shrink in size as it moves through the eastern Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday. The storm is expected to trek up along the western Florida coast before making landfall north of Tampa on Wednesday morning.

There may be a small window of opportunity for Elsa to regain strength over the warm waters near the Straits of Florida and in the eastern Gulf of Mexico, prior to moving inland over the Sunshine State.

Elsa is anticipated to produce its rainfall totals of 4 to 8 inches, with an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 15 inches, across Florida.

Rain is anticipated to overspread the rest of the southeastern U.S. through midweek.

Flash flooding could result, especially areas that pick up 4 to 8 inches of rain, from Florida into southern South Carolina. A wide swath of at least 1 to 2 inches will spread from the Florida Peninsula into the Carolinas.

Tampa is among the locales expected to be doused by 2 to 4 inches of rain, in addition to a storm surge of 1 to 3 feet anticipated, AccuWeather Meteorologist Thomas Geiger explained. Winds can gust up to 40 to 60 mph.

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In preparation for the storm, MacDill Air Force Base in Tampa, Florida began evacuations, according to a reporter. On Tuesday, the base will have limited access to “mission essential personnel only."

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a state of emergency for 15 counties across the state ahead of landfall in the United States. Charlotte, Citrus, Collier, DeSoto, Hardee, Hernando, Hillsborough, Lee, Levy, Manatee, Miami-Dade, Monroe, Pasco, Pinellas and Sarasota counties are all included under the state of emergency.

One of these counties, Miami-Dade, is where recovery teams are still searching through the rubble of the disastrous Surfside condo collapse.

"All visitors should heed local evacuation orders if those orders are issued,” said DeSantis.

Tampa's Mayor Jane Castor suggested residents clean up around their yards and make sure there aren't any loose items around that could get blown by high winds.

"Now's the time we're starting to make a lot of those phone calls with different agencies just to make sure that if we did have to respond quickly in the next couple of days, everything is in place so that we could get moving and get people to safety quickly," said Pinellas County Government Spokesperson Josh Boatwright.

AccuWeather forecasters urge residents to have an evacuation plan and prepare an emergency or hurricane kit, stocked with water, non-perishable food, chargers for electronics, batteries and a way to get the latest information on the storm.

In addition to heavy rainfall and gusty winds, isolated tornadoes could be spawned along the northeastern side of the storm's path.

"One of the more recent hurricanes with a path that could remotely resemble Elsa's projection near Florida was Irma from September 2017," AccuWeather Senior Meteorologist Alex Sosnowski said. Irma reached the Florida Keys and southwestern Florida as a potent Category 4 hurricane. The hurricane pushed northward on Florida's west coast and caused 10 fatalities and $50 billion in damages in the U.S. with power outages that reached 7.5 million in Florida alone, according to the National Hurricane Center.

"Elsa should lose wind intensity and become a tropical depression quite quickly once it makes landfall due to interaction with the land," said Geiger.

However, it may restrengthen as it exits the East Coast into the Atlantic Ocean and could bring rough surf, strong winds and rain to the New England coast, as well as Atlantic Canada.

Should the storm track farther west than currently anticipated, rain and wind may sideswipe more of the Northeast coast, a scenario that forecasters are monitoring closely.

AccuWeather meteorologists will keep providing updates on Elsa throughout the week.

SEE ALSO:

Weather sends baseball grounds crewman on wild tarp ride
This weather event has killed more Americans on average than hurricanes
Elsa kills 3, leaves trail of destruction in the Caribbean
Elsa looms as Floridians, vacationers brace for season’s 1st tropical strike

Keep checking back on AccuWeather.com and stay tuned to the AccuWeather Network on DirecTV, Frontier, Spectrum, FuboTV, Philo, and Verizon Fios.

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