FORT LAURELDALE, Fla. Tropical storm Grace formed Saturday morning in the Atlantic Ocean. It saw its wind speed drop and its track shift west. This forced Palm Beach and most Broward to flee its path.
Florida will still be affected by the storm, according to a long-range forecast.
Grace was named the seventh storm of the Atlantic hurricane season. It has a track similar to Fred, which is now a tropical wave, according to the National Hurricane Center in its 5 p.m. Update.
Grace was located 55 miles east-southeast from the eastern Caribbean at 5 p.m. It was moving west at 26 mph and sustained winds of 40mph. This is 5 mph less than it was 3 hours earlier.
The U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico were notified of a tropical storm warning. Forecasters predict that Grace could reach Dominican Republic on Monday. It is expected to bring heavy rainfall and flooding.
There are two possible routes for the storms: the Gulf of Mexico and further up the northeast coast of America. It may track Tropical Storm Fred through the mountains of northern Caribbean. This could reduce its potential for becoming dangerously strong. According to the current forecast, the storm will reach 50 mph at its closest approach to the Dominican Republic in the early part of next week.
According to the long-range forecast, it will be parked in Florida Straits by Thursday as weak tropical storm with 45 mph sustained wind and 60 mph gusts.
The system is currently small, with tropical-storm force winds stretching out to 35 miles.
Over the next few days, the storm is expected move west or westward. Forecasters predict that the storm's center will pass over the eastern Caribbean islands on Saturday night, before passing over Puerto Rico and the U.S Virgin Islands on Sunday. Tropical Storm Grace is expected move over the Dominican Republic Sunday night, and then over Haiti Monday night.
This storm, like Fred, could encounter mountainous islands in the northern Caribbean. These could make it weaker and pose a danger to the United States. The National Hurricane Center said that the model showed the storm becoming hurricane-force in just three days.
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Jamie Rhome, a National Hurricane Center meteorologist, stated that it is too early to speculate on potential impacts to the Southeast Coast of the United States. It is August. It's middle of hurricane season. It will be moving in the vicinity of the United States for the next five to seven day.
Robert Molleda is the National Weather Service's warning coordination meteorologist in Miami. He said that the weather conditions ahead of the storm don't seem to be favorable for it getting very strong. He said that the storm's predicted course was similar to Fred's, which was weakened after a trip across mountainous islands in the Caribbean. He said it was still early and forecasters will soon be able to predict the storm's path and strength.
He said that it doesn't pose a threat to South Florida right now. We will be keeping an eye on it to see what happens over the next few days.
According to AccuWeather (private forecasting service), the storm faces challenges such as dry air, wind shear, and crosswinds that could hinder the formation of a rotating tropical cyclone.
According to AccuWeather Meteorologist Adam Douty, the tropical rainstorm is located in an area of dry air. It also has some African dust to its west and north which slows down development.
