A lull in the tropics from mid July to mid August is ending with three storms forming in the past week. Tropical Storm Fred will hit the Florida Panhandle on Monday and bring rain up the Appalachians as it moves inland. Eventually, some of the rain from Fred will reach Southern New England around Thursday, but it will not be a big impact storm as the structure of the storm will have totally fallen apart by then.
Tropical Depression Grace is hitting Hispaniola early in the week. Haiti already got hit by Fred and then had a massive 7.2 earthquake this weekend. While Grace is not expected to be a strong storm, the wind/rain will make a dire situation even worse. Unlike Fred, Grace will not turn north in the Gulf of Mexico. The latest information suggests that the storm will continue westward and may clip the Yucatan Peninsula before hitting Mexico late in the week or early next week.
Tropical Depression Eight is swirling around in the Atlantic Ocean near Bermuda. The storm will head southwest then west and back to the north in the next 5-7 days. Anytime there is a storm off the East Coast, it needs to be watched. Most computer models keep the storm that will likely become Henri off the coast and in the Atlantic Ocean.
This graphic shows they tropical cyclone potential in the Atlantic Basin over the next 45 days. Keep in mind this is a computer ensemble with 50 members, so there are bound to be LOTS of solutions. Each of these lines represents a storm track, but only about a 2% chance of actually happening (1 out of 50 members). This is already an active hurricane season, and it looks like it will continue. Furthermore, some long-range computer models indicate that it will stay active longer than normal – just like last season. Get prepared to hear quite a bit about tropical activity on the TV news in the next 2-3 months.
