Posted on 05/09/2007 9:12:22 AM PDT by STARWISE
The first named storm of the year formed Wednesday off the southeastern U.S. coast, more than three weeks before the official start of the Atlantic hurricane season, forecasters said.
Subtropical Storm Andrea had top sustained winds around 45 mph Wednesday morning and didn't appear to be much of a threat, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said. Still, a tropical storm watch was issued for parts of Georgia and Florida, meaning tropical storm conditions are possible within 36 hours.
"We're not looking at this system strengthening significantly," said Richard Pasch, a senior hurricane specialist at the center. "We're not viewing this as a major threat."
At 11 a.m. EDT, Andrea was centered about 140 miles southeast of Savannah, Ga., and about 150 miles northeast of Daytona Beach. The storm was moving west at about 3 mph.
Forecasters said no significant rain from the storm was expected to fall over land through at least Thursday morning. But wind-driven waves have been causing beach erosion in South Carolina, Georgia and Florida and the ocean has lapped at beachfront homes and condominiums.
Subtropical systems are hybrid weather formations that are usually weaker than hurricanes and tropical storms. They are kind of a half-breed, sharing characteristics of tropical systems, which get their power from warm ocean water at their centers, and more typical bad weather that forms when warm and cold fronts collide, Pasch said.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Ping!
I just hate it when they get a name!
DOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM.
Please tell Gore to buy a few more carbon offsets.
That should make it go away.
Look for Algore to be on the beaches of Georgia saying this is a sign of global warming.
It’s global warming! It’s global warming! It’s global warming! It’s global warming!
I can hear Algore all the way from here shouting “YESSSS!”
We here in GA could use the rain. We are critically behind for the year already and heading into the hot dry summer months.
Especially southest GA and northeast FL where the wildfires are going gangbusters.
Here’s hoping we get a drencher from this.
We are naming cold fronts now? LOL.
Someone needs to tell Andrea a lady never arrives early.
Ana in 2003 was the last time we had one of these in May, IIRC.
I’ll wait until it’s a little father from that butterfly’s wing.
Me 2!!!! But then I was in FL for the “no-name storm” after Andrew ... you probably were, too. Horrible.
Once a storm gets a name the Insurance companies dont have to pay as much.
They will be naming thunderstorms next.
Ana became a tropical system April 20, 2003. Ana was the first Atlantic tropical storm of record to exist in the month of April.
There are about 100 or so Tropical Cyclones each year and they can occur just about anywhere in the Tropics or near them. They are extremely rare in the South Atlantic (I know of two recorded storms) and almost non existant in the Southeast Pacific, but other than that, watch out. If conditions are right, they will form, regardless of the calendar.
Likely, everyone will be in a tailspin about how early the season is and how bad it will be, and nothing could happen, much like last year.
OTOH, we could be in for a doozy.
We’ll know when it’s over.
When the weather this March was absolutely stunning, a bunch of us Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida residents prognosticated that early to mid-May would probably be, well, really sucky.
Unfortunately, we were right. It’s going to be windy and rainy all week.
The bright spot is that at least it looks like the firefighters are going to get a hand in battling all the brush fires down here (and I won’t have to add water to my swimming pool for the next week or two).
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