With just days left until the official close of hurricane season, forecasters are monitoring two areas for potential development: a tropical disturbance in the central Caribbean and a non-tropical system located southeast of Bermuda. The latter has the potential to become a tropical or subtropical storm, forecasters said Tuesday.
The tropical disturbance, located north of Colombia and south of Haiti, is encountering dry air that makes it difficult for storms to develop. As of 1 a.m. Tuesday, the National Hurricane Center had given it only a 10% chance of developing over the next two to seven days.
Forecasters said the system would begin to move slowly west toward Nicaragua in the coming days.
Meanwhile, a non-tropical low pressure system southeast of Bermuda has the potential to become a tropical or subtropical storm later this week. If a tropical storm formed, it would be called Vince.
The system is developing along a front in the central Atlantic and is forecast to travel southeast, where it would encounter warmer water, favoring tropical development.
As of 1 a.m. Tuesday, it had been given a 50% chance of developing in the next seven days and a 10% chance in the next two days. It is projected to turn northeast over the weekend.
Non-tropical systems, such as the Atlantic low and the storm that dumped up to 12 inches of rain on areas of South Florida last week, get their energy from the interaction of cold and warm air, while tropical systems get their energy of the warm waters of the ocean. .
There have been 19 named storms in this Atlantic hurricane season this year, seven of which were hurricanes. Three of them were major hurricanes, that is, at least category 3.
The two remaining storm names from the initial list of 21 names of the year are Vince and Whitney.
Hurricane season ends on November 30.
