Tropical Depression 13 to become TS Julia Friday
Tropical Depression 13 is passing over Columbia and parts of Venezuela Friday morning with a forecast to become Tropical Storm Julia by Friday.
On Thursday morning, the NHC released information on “Potential Tropical Cyclone 13.″ As of 5 a.m., the system is officially a Tropical Depression and has maximum sustained winds of 35 mph and a forward motion of 15 mph. TD 13 is 35 miles southeast of the Guajira Peninsula in northern Colombia.
As a result, the government of Colombia has issued a Hurricane Watch for San Andres, Providencia, and Santa Catalina Islands and a Tropical Storm Warning for the coast of Colombia from the Colombia/Venezuela border westward to Riohacha — where models predict 3 to 6 inches of rainfall, which could become life-threatening with some isolated areas receiving 12 inches.
After passing over the tip of Columbia, meteorologists are predicting TD 13 to move across the southwestern Caribbean Sea and approach the coast of Nicaragua on Sunday as a hurricane. Before it does, the depression is expected to become a tropical storm later today. Once it’s free of land interaction the system should then begin to intensify in the warm waters of the Caribbean, where sea-surface temperatures are between 82 and 82 degrees — ideal for tropical formation, according to the Spectrum News 13 SST map.
If it does develop, it will take on the name Julia.
An Air Force Reserve Hurricane Hunter aircraft is scheduled to investigate the system this morning.
Further east, Tropical Depression 12 dissipated earlier than expected Thursday night about 860 miles west-northwest of the Cabo Verde Islands.
TD 12 formed about 705 miles west of the Cabo Verde Islands with sustained winds of 35 mph moving west-northwest at 12 mph. By Thursday afternoon, TD 12 was barely a depression and losing organization due to strong vertical wind shear, keeping the depression’s form ragged and unable to gain strength, said NHC specialist Andy Latto.
“Strong west-southwesterly shear is expected to increase further while the surrounding thermodynamic environment continues to dry out over the next couple of days,” Latto said. “Therefore, it is still anticipated that the depression will degenerate into a remnant low soon, and dissipate in a day or so.”
So far, the 2022 hurricane season has produced nine named storms and one more tropical depression that spun up and fell apart while Ian was striking Florida. The NHC also tracked one other potential cyclone that never grew into a depression, so that is why the most recent tropical depression is named TD 12.
Initially, the season was off to a slow start with a quiet July and August, but the season has picked up the pace since Sept. 1 with the emergence of four hurricanes including Fiona and Ian in the last two weeks. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted the season to be an above-average year in storm production calling for 14-21 named storms. An average year has 14.
Hurricane season ends on Nov. 30.
