Potential Hurricane in the Picture for the Caribbean and Central America

Posted: October 6, 2022 10:12 am

While Florida and coastal Carolina are focused on the massive cleanup efforts one week after Hurricane Ian first made landfall in the U.S., forecasters with the National Hurricane Center (NHC) are keeping busy monitoring a new tropical distance roaming the Caribbean Sea. While this system is not expected to threaten the U.S., it could still wreak havoc in the southern Caribbean in the coming days. Here is what you need to know about the latest conditions in the tropics.

Image provided by NOAA

Latest on Developing Tropical Rainstorm

The new tropical rainstorm is visible on satellite as it moves closer to the Windward Islands. The NHC has designated this system as Invest 91L with the expectation that it could grow into a tropical depression or storm by the end of the weekend.

Trinidad and Tobago were pounded with heavy rain on Wednesday as the rainstorm moved across the group of islands. While the center of the storm was poorly defined, the associated moisture and energy were enough to trigger thunderstorms. Officials were forced to issue an adverse weather alert as flooding unleashed over the streets and rivers reached capacity. The heavy rain was reaching as far as Grenada and into the northern portions of Guyana and Venezuela.

An area of high pressure is currently anchored over the Caribbean’s northernmost islands, making it less likely that the rainstorm will intensify quickly. This high pressure is forecast to pair with strong wind shear throughout the weekend to mitigate the odds of further development. It is these factors that will also keep the storm moving to the west instead of curving to the north toward the U.S.

Central American Put on Alert

However, those in Central America will want to keep an eye on the development and movement of this storm system. There is a good chance that this corner of the Atlantic basin could see a tropical storm or hurricane take root by early next week out of this feature.

The storm will likely be limited by its close proximity to South America. In addition, strong wind shear is predicted to break it up as it moves to the west across the southern Caribbean by Friday. This means that intensification is not likely through the end of the work week.

This does not mean that the feature will not deliver stormy weather to those in its path. The Windward Islands and the ABC Islands will see the next impacts, followed by areas along the northern coast of South America through the balance of the week.

The rain may be heavy enough to lead to flash flooding. Mudslides will also be a concern over the hilly terrain. The gusty winds could cause sporadic power outages. Lastly, the feature may be strong enough to trigger rough sea conditions, posing a danger to beachgoers and those operating small watercraft.

The greatest chance for intensification for this system will happen over the weekend when it moves into the warmer open waters of the southwestern Caribbean. Not only will the system find much warmer ocean water temperatures but there is also less wind shear hovering in this region of the Atlantic. These conditions will provide the fertile environmental conditions needed for organization and intensification.

What is Next for Invest 91L?

Forecasters are predicting that the breezes will steer the feature to the west or northwest as it moves into the western Caribbean. This will put an area stretching from Panama to Belize and into southeastern Mexico in the potential line of fire.

Where the storm begins to intensify and the exact timing will influence what parts of Central America may take a hit. There is also the chance that the system could stay intact well enough to move across Central America and come out in the eastern Pacific. This is a similar path to what Bonnie took last June, eventually turning into a major hurricane in the eastern Pacific Ocean.

While most people do not associate this time of year with major hurricanes, it was less than two years ago that some areas of Central America were hit hard by two separate Category 4 storms. Hurricane Eta first hit some portions of Nicaragua and Honduras during the early part of November before Hurricane Iota slammed into the coast of Nicaragua in nearly the same place as Eta had two weeks prior.

While it is highly unlikely, there is also a small chance that the storm could pick up enough steam over the southwestern Caribbean that it begins to influence the steering breezes surrounding it. This movement could put the storm on a northward journey, bringing it closer to the Caribbean islands and the mainland U.S.

Other Tropical Features of Note

In addition to Invest 91L, the NHC is also monitoring a system that is churning in the eastern Atlantic near the Cabo Verde Islands. The NHC designated this system as Tropical Depressive Twelve late Tuesday. As of the Wednesday update, the depression was located about 550 miles west of the Cabo Verde Islands and packing maximum sustained winds of 35 mph.

While the system could strengthen into a tropical storm at any time, it is not currently threatening any major land masses. The next two names on the NHC list forecasters to identify storms are Julia and Karl.

Did you find this content useful? Feel free to bookmark or to post to your timeline for reference later.