Tampa Bay could get ‘excessive rainfall’ today as storms roll through, forecasters say
Heavy rain and thunderstorms rolled through the Tampa Bay area this morning and the stormy weather could continue throughout the day, forecasters say.
The National Weather Service in Ruskin issued a tweet Wednesday morning saying that locally heavy rainfall is possible and that there is a marginal risk for “excessive rainfall” as well.
Our partners at Spectrum Bay News 9 also were reporting on the heavy rain and storms this morning, which include “frequent lightning.”
The stormy weather is moving east from the Gulf of Mexico. The storms appear to be very slow-moving.
The rain will at least cool the area down. On Monday, a thermometer at Tampa International Airport recorded a temperature of 97, the highest for any July 26 in the recorded history of the city.
Bay News 9 forecasters predicted a 60 percent chance of rain today, though rain chances will drop to 50 percent and 40 percent later in the week and through the weekend.
In Pasco County, Fire Rescue on Wednesday morning reported receiving multiple calls of flooded streets and that crews were helping motorists out of stalled vehicles.
Scattered power outages also were reported. As of about 11:45 a.m., Duke Energy’s outage map showed fewer than 1,000 customers without power, while Tampa Electric was reporting less than 200 customers without power after several thousand had power knocked out earlier in the morning.
Here are some more photos of this morning’s weather:
