Tropical Depression Twenty-Seven Forms in the Central Atlantic, Should Intensify Into a Hurricane

• Tropical Depression Twenty-Seven has formed in the Atlantic.
• The depression is forecast to become Hurricane Epsilon.
• Another area of disturbed weather in the western Caribbean is also being tracked.

Tropical Depression Twenty-Seven has formed in the central Atlantic and is expected to intensify into Hurricane Epsilon before tracking close to Bermuda later this week. There’s also an area that bears watching for tropical development in the western Caribbean Sea.

Here’s a look at the forecast for what to expect.

Tropical Depression Twenty-Seven

Tropical Depression Twenty-Seven is centered about 700 miles southeast of Bermuda and is not moving at this time.

The depression is forecast to intensify into Tropical Storm Epsilon as soon as later Monday. It could become the Atlantic’s 10th hurricane of the season by midweek.

With blocking high pressure aloft to its north, this system won’t be able to simply take off immediately into the open North Atlantic, but instead will be steered northwestward.

That track may allow future Epsilon to move near Bermuda as a hurricane by late in the week ahead. It’s too early to provide specific forecast impacts for Bermuda, but bands of heavy rain and strong winds are possible.

This system isn’t a threat to the U.S. East Coast.

However, the pressure difference between strong high pressure over the North Atlantic Ocean and future Epsilon should eventually generate swells that will push toward parts of the East Coast, leading to high surf and rip currents later this week.

This rough surf should also extend to the Bahamas, and north-facing coasts of Hispaniola, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the Leeward Islands.

Parts of the U.S. East Coast are already seeing coastal flooding and rip currents early this week. That is being caused by a combination of king tides and onshore winds from an area of high pressure.

Western Caribbean Sea

The other area we’re watching is in the western Caribbean Sea.

A broad area of low pressure may develop this week east of central America and south of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands.

While some ocean heat content was churned up by Tropical Storm Gamma and Hurricane Delta, the Caribbean Sea is still plenty warm enough to support tropical development.

If the broader low-pressure system can tighten up into a more defined circulation with colocated thunderstorm activity, then a tropical depression could form sometime later this week in this area. Beyond that, the strength or final track of this potential system remains highly uncertain.

This area of low pressure could enhance rainfall across the western Caribbean region this week. It’s too soon to know if this potential system will affect any other land areas in the long-term future.

We’ve already blown through 25 storms this season, requiring the use of the Greek alphabet for additional named storms for only the second time.

The record 2005 Atlantic hurricane season also used up the first six letters of the Greek alphabet, but it took until the end of December for “Zeta” to form that year.

One unnamed subtropical storm was found in post-analysis of the 2005 season, thus bringing that season’s record total to 28 storms.

 

This article was originally published on weather.com