While most of the attention on the tropical storm swirling off the coast of Cuba on Saturday has been focused on its expected impact on Florida this weekend, some indications suggest the storm could have a second life off the southeastern U.S. coast, bringing new threats of flooding rains, damaging winds and dangerous storm surges.
What will likely become Tropical Storm Debby late Saturday is expected to make landfall along the northwest Florida coast late Sunday or early Monday as a strong tropical storm or weak hurricane.
The storm’s next move becomes unclear as it moves inland into north Florida.
As the steering current weakens, the storm will slow down over northern Florida.
“All of the computer models are showing a trend towards this storm slowing down dramatically,” said Fox Weather meteorologist Britta Merwin.
Current forecasts call for the storm to drift along the southeastern U.S. coastline through the middle of this week, or longer, before heading back out into the Atlantic Ocean.
“When a tropical cyclone forms in the Atlantic, it creates a very warm channel of water called the Gulf Stream,” Merwin says, “and if a storm forms directly above that, it’s going to pick up that warm water, slow down, and continue to hit the Carolinas, and at that point it has enough heat to potentially become a hurricane.”
Debby, which could regain strength, could bring a dangerous combination of heavy rain, high winds and even a several-foot storm surge to coastal Georgia and the Carolinas for several days, and could make landfall a second time as a tropical storm or hurricane.
“There’s a chance that this storm could stall offshore, and that’s a really worst-case scenario, but it’s a worst-case scenario that we need to be prepared for,” Merwin said. “When you see a forecast that looks like a big fishbowl, it means two things: either the storm is slowing down or the storm is stalled, both of which mean that there will be heavy rain and winds for an extended period of time. Unfortunately, if the storm is stalled offshore, it means that the storm could be strengthening and stalling offshore.”
The National Hurricane Center warned that rainfall totals could reach 5 to 10 inches by mid-week, with as much as 15 inches possible in some places.
FOX Weather
“Very heavy rainfall is expected across parts of the Southeast coast, including Savannah, Hilton Head, Charleston and southern North Carolina,” National Hurricane Director Michael Brennan told FOX Weather.
The risk of flash flooding in the area from Jacksonville to Myrtle Beach on Monday is a Level 3 out of 4 on NOAA’s flash flood risk scale.
“This is the area of most concern where we could see some really heavy rainfall,” he said.
It’s too early to tell what the potential storm surge will be or how strong the winds will be around the eyewall, but with Florida in the spotlight this weekend, people living along the coasts of North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia should start preparing for the possibility of tropical storm or hurricane force winds early next week.
