Early spaghetti models show tropical wave could be headed to Gulf
Tampa Bay could experience the first effects of the 2021 hurricane season next week if a tropical wave continues on its projected path into the Gulf of Mexico.
Early spaghetti models show that the wave, which was about 1,300 miles east-southeast of the Windward Islands on Wednesday afternoon, is expected to travel north through Jamaica, Cuba and eventually into the Gulf, where it could be right off the Tampa Bay coast sometime next week.
Spectrum Bay News 9 Meteorologist Nick Merianos said that it’s still too soon to know for certain where the storm will strike and what strength it will be.
“We’ll be monitoring this as we get into next week to see what impacts, if any, will be across our region,” he said.
Forecast cones from the National Hurricane Center — used to show a projected path for a storm up to five days out — show the storm reaching Florida’s southern tip on Monday afternoon, which is in line with the spaghetti models.
For now, the tropical wave in the central Atlantic Ocean is just that — a broad low-pressure area with showers and thunderstorms that’s still thousands of miles from any Florida coastline.
Governmental meteorologists said the wave will soon reach tropical storm strength with sustained winds of at least 39 mph. The hurricane center wrote in a 2 p.m. advisory that there is a 90 percent chance that will happen in the next five days and a 70 percent chance it happens in the next two.
The tropical wave will be named Elsa once it reaches tropical storm strength.
If the wave becomes a tropical storm in the coming days as expected, it could also set a record as the earliest fifth named storm to form in the Atlantic. The current record was set last year when Tropical Storm Edouard formed on July 6.
The system was moving at 21 mph to the northwest on Wednesday afternoon. The hurricane center said conditions appear generally favorable for continued development this week and that it could become a tropical depression by Thursday and reach Hispaniola by Saturday.
The tropics were quiet elsewhere on Wednesday afternoon, as the hurricane center announced it will stop releasing updates about another tropical wave that recently lost steam in the southeastern Caribbean Sea.
But Florida is still in for a rainy holiday weekend.
Forecasters expect the Fourth of July to be a hot and wet one. Bay News 9′s forecast for Saturday and Sunday calls for a 40 percent chance of rain with high temperatures in the low 90s.
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2021 Tampa Bay Times hurricane guide
IT’S STORM SEASON: Get ready and stay informed at tampabay.com/hurricane
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