Tropics Heating Up - For Some

By: Christy Henderson | News Channel 7
Published: July 17, 2008 | 0 Comments | Post a Comment

Hurricane Season runs from June 1st to November 30th. We've made our way through the 2nd named storm of the season - Bertha. Bertha is the "energizer" storm - it just keeps going...and going...and going...Remember just a little more than a week ago we were talking about major hurricane Bertha. Then it weakened and remains a strong tropical storm tonight with no threat to land. Yesterday Bertha became the longest lived tropical system for the month of July in the Atlantic Basin (Atlantic Ocean + Gulf of Mexico + Caribbean), and it's most likely going to be able to keep T.S. characteristics into the weekend. "Bertha" won't be retired, though - it didn't cause any significant damage. That means that in 2014 the "B" named storm will once again be Bertha. There are six lists of named for the Atlantic so we'll cycle through five more before Bertha's year returns.

The next named storm will be "Cristobal". Who knows when and where that one will form, but there are several suspicious areas out there tonight that will, at the very least, bring rainy and windy conditions to some locations. Besides Bertha there is a tropical disturbance about to move through the Lesser Antilles over the next day or so. This is the one that's shown some potential for a couple of days now but hasn't been able to get organized. The Hurricane Hunters checked it out this afternoon and were unable to find a well defined closed circulation, so for now it remains a disorganized group of storms. Have any friends vacationing in Barbados or St. Lucia? Trust me - it was no day at the beach here.

The other area we're watching is in the Western Caribbean - east of Nicaragua. This too is simply a tropical disturbance rather than an organized depression or storm. Lastly and closest to home, an area of low pressure over Florida has formed along a stalled frontal boundary. It looks like this system will move northward tomorrow to send some moisture in our direction. This will mean (finally!) a good chance for some showers and thunderstorms around by Friday and into Saturday.