Remnants Of Pacific Storm Could Bring Heavy Rains To FL: Forecasters

FLORIDA — The remnants of a tropical depression in the Pacific Ocean could cross over Mexico to fuel the development of a low pressure area in the Gulf of Mexico — one that could bring heavy rains to Florida next week, forecasters said.

Floridians are eyeing this and another potential system as recovery efforts continue one week after Hurricane Helene made landfall in the Big Bend area as a powerful Category 4 storm before tearing across much of the Southeast.

Helene’s death toll is at least 213 in six states as of Friday morning, CNN reported.

This includes 106 dead in North Carolina, 41 in South Carolina, 33 in Georgia, 20 in Florida, 11 in Tennessee and two in Virginia. Hundreds remain unaccounted for and the death toll is expected to climb.

About 730,000 remain without power Friday across the Southeast, according to PowerOutage.us.

This includes nearly 274,000 customers in South Carolina, about 230,000 in North Carolina, nearly 203,000 in Georgia, about 13,000 in Virginia and about 10,000 in Florida.

Forecasters are watching two areas that could impact Florida. The first is the “weaker one,” Denis Phillips, chief meteorologist for ABC Action News, wrote in a Facebook post.

This potential system will increase the chances of rain for the Tampa Bay area and other parts of the Florida peninsula Sunday through Tuesday, he wrote.

It’s currently producing showers and thunderstorms over the western Gulf of Mexico and could form over the southwestern or south-central Gulf this weekend, the National Hurricane Center said.

After this, “some gradual development is possible while the low moves slowly eastward or northeastward,” NHC forecasters said. “A tropical or subtropical depression or storm
could form during the early to middle part of next week if the low remains separate from a frontal boundary that is forecast to extend across the Gulf of Mexico next week. Regardless of tropical or
subtropical development, locally heavy rains could occur over portions of Mexico during the next few days and over portions of the Florida Peninsula late this weekend into next week.”

The area has a 40 percent chance of strengthening into a tropical depression over the next seven days, the agency said.

This system “will spread rain across the state on Sunday through midweek,” Phillips wrote.

“Total predictions vary wildly, but the heaviest will be from Tampa southward. There will be no surge or wind issues with this system. Just rain.”

Meanwhile, the remnants of Tropical Depression Eleven-E in the eastern Pacific are expected to move north across southern Mexico, the NHC said. “Scattered moderate convection is expected to
continue across the waters from Chiapas westward to offshore of Guerrero for the next few days, where winds and seas will be locally higher.”

Phillips expects this system to “fizzle overnight and attempt to cross Mexico.”

There’s uncertainty about what former Tropical Depression Eleven-E might do after this, he wrote. “Some models … redevelop it in the SW Gulf of Mexico. If that happens, and stays South, it will avoid shear and could develop further. I would say we'll actually know more by Saturday. IF it is able to maintain some sort of organization as it enters the Bay of Campeche, there's a decent chance it will develop further. If it doesn't, there won't be anything left to worry about.”

If it does develop, it would happen mid to late next week, he added.

Once it crosses over Mexico, “it will likely combine with another pocket of spin to create a more dominant area and potential low in the Gulf,” Matt Devitt, WINK meteorologist, wrote in a Facebook post.

While “nothing is imminent … anything that does develop next week would likely head east” toward Florida, Fox 13’s Paul Dellegatto wrote in a Facebook post.

AccuWeather meteorologists warn, though, that this area could intensify in the Gulf.

"Should development take place in the southwestern gulf and move along a narrow east-northeast path toward the Florida Peninsula, there is the time and potential for the feature to strengthen into a tropical storm and hurricane," AccuWeather’s lead hurricane expert, Alex DaSilva, said.