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The so-called “Mean Season” is getting grumpy, as the National Weather Service’s National Hurricane Center (NHC) is homing in on a low-pressure weather system in the eastern Gulf of America.
Hurricane season has been mostly quiet until this week. But officials with the NHC have identified a system that could possibly develop into a tropical disturbance. An NHC tracking map shows weather forecasters spotlighting an area over the Gulf Coast of Florida from just south of Tampa north to areas near Tallahassee.
The system would then be projected to move from Florida’s Gulf Coast northeast through the state, possibly as far north as the South Carolina coast.
“An area of low pressure is expected to form during the weekend over the northeastern Gulf of America,” reads an NHC statement posted at 8 a.m. on Wednesday.
“Subsequent slow development of this system is possible while it moves slowly northeastward over the northeastern Gulf and or near the southeastern coast of the United States by early next week.”
The NHC forecasts there is no chance that a tropical system will form within the next two days. But there is a 20% chance of tropical development within the next week.
Hurricane season officially runs from June 1 through Nov. 30. There has been no tropical system development in the Gulf, Atlantic basin or Caribbean so far. If the current weather system under watch does develop into a tropical storm, it would be called Bertha.
There are 20 potential storm names this year. A tropical system has to reach winds of 39 mph before it gets a moniker. A system is upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane if it exceeds winds of 74 mph on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane wind scale that the NHC uses.
NHC officials have forecast that this year will be a “below normal” hurricane season, with eight to 14 named storms expected to be generated in the Atlantic and Gulf regions.
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