A tropical disturbance in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico is shaping up to be the next hurricane of the season, the National Hurricane Center said Monday morning. It will be called Francine and will end a brief lull in hurricane-prone regions.
The hurricane center said the system is expected to become a tropical storm Monday and a hurricane before making landfall, likely on the northwest U.S. Gulf Coast Wednesday, bringing with it an “increasing risk of life-threatening storm surge and hurricane-force winds along the Louisiana and northern Texas coasts.”
NOAA / National Hurricane Center
Forecasters expect the system to dump 4 to 8 inches of rain in many areas and up to 12 inches in some places.
Tropical storm-force winds extended up to 185 miles from the system’s center early Monday.
The center was located about 295 miles (475 kilometers) south-southeast of the mouth of the Rio Grande and about 530 miles (860 kilometers) south of Cameron, Louisiana. It was moving north-northwest at a speed of 5 mph (8 km/h).
The disturbance had maximum sustained winds of 50 mph, well above the 39 mph needed to be officially classified as a tropical storm, but its center was not yet clearly defined enough to earn that classification, said CBS senior weather and climate producer David Parkinson.
A tropical storm watch was in effect for Barra del Tordo, Mexico, to the mouth of the Rio Grande and from there to Port Mansfield, Texas.
The disruption follows an unusually quiet August and early September in the Atlantic hurricane season, which saw five named storms.
Experts had predicted one of the busiest Atlantic seasons ever, and, the Associated Press notes, Colorado State University researchers said last week that they still expect an above-normal season overall.
