Tropical Storm Gordan in Atlantic, heavy rain possible on East Coast | Tropical Weather Forecast

All right. A good Saturday to you. Thanks for finding us here on YouTube and on Fox26houston.com. I'm meteorologist John Dawson. Hope you made it through Friday the 13th. Let's focus on what's happening this weekend in the tropics. There is quite a bit to talk about, although you'll notice quite quickly I'm not going to be spending a lot of time really discussing the named storm that is actually out in the Atlantic, because it's just not really going to pose much of a threat for very many folks. But we don't want to give Gordon too much downplay if Gordon wants its attention as well. So we'll talk about. But let's sort of dive into things just a little bit. We start with just a quick review. We've had seven named storms. So far this year, all of those with the exception of Gordon, which is the one that's currently out there, have made interaction with land. And four of those were hurricanes, three of them tropical storms and three of those hurricanes making landfall along the Gulf Coast. That would, of course, would be Beryl, Debbie and Francine Beryl here in the Houston area. Francine most recently in Louisiana. And then Debbie was over in the Florida area when it made its landfall. So this is what I think most of us in the U.S. are going to be concerned with. Is this area of potential development of a tropical system. It is not happening right now. It's going to need a couple more days. But even if it doesn't become tropical, a non-tropical form of whatever this ends up being, it's certainly going to impact portions of the East Coast. This right off the Carolinas is where we're looking at, and we really think within the next couple of days, a tropical depression could be formed, but it also could be a sub tropical, just meaning that it doesn't quite meet all of the characteristics of a tropical system, but it would kind of perhaps act like one. And it also needs to be very separated in its own entity. If it's sort of a merging with something else or feeding off of something, it's not technically a tropical system. So sometimes these sorts of situations are a little bit difficult on the National Hurricane Center because they know this is going to be a weather maker, something that's impactful, but they only have certain ways that they can communicate with systems that aren't technically tropical. So 50% chance that this could develop into a depression or a storm over the next week. We do have several days that we're going to continue to watch this. This area of low pressure here, that's up over the Mississippi and over impacting Alabama as well. This is actually the remnants of Francine. So what's left over of Francine is still kind of hanging around creating some weather, creating some rain. There's a stalled boundary here. And out on the other end of that stalled front is where this sort of broader area of low pressure and this area of low pressure is extending more than just where we've got the El here on the map. But just giving you the idea of sort of that setup that's currently in place. And you'll notice again, that orange shading there on our last map, that's this large area right off of the Carolinas. That's where the formation might take place should it happen over the next couple of days. Now from the Weather Prediction Center, the possibility of some flash flooding, you'll know, when we were talking about the remnants of Francine, Mississippi, Alabama, those are the highest areas where we're seeing that potential for some flooding. This is for tomorrow, not for Saturday, but for Sunday. But watch what happens when we shift into Monday. We're now looking at some flash flooding risks over a little further to the East coast. This is because of that potential tropical system, that area that's sort of parked over here at the edge of the Carolinas and on the edge of that front that's out there. So again, no matter what, this ends up being Tropically speaking. We're looking at the possibility of a lot of rain, and we're going to be able to see that pretty clear here on our exclusive Fox model. Notice how we get a little bit of a swirl going here. It's fairly broad in its nature, but watch how this brings some rain. And then this swirl continues to bring even more rain and then moves further inland, basically heading towards Ohio directly from the east coast there. So this is what we're going to be watching our computer modeling. All of them are sort of struggling still to get a workout on what's happening here. But our Fox model I think gives us a really good general idea of what could happen, whether this ends up being a tropical system or not. So remember, there's that 50% chance of development. So it's not to impacts. But that's where it would actually become a tropical system. And yes, here's our friend Gordon out in the Atlantic as I mentioned. This is going to be one of those systems that just impacts water. These are our favorite kind. It does what needs to happen within our environment where it's releasing energy. You're getting all that rain getting all that storm. Although this tropical storm is not going to grow much stronger, you'll notice it's switching from a tropical storm to a depression once we get into tomorrow afternoon. And that's because we're getting involved in some slightly cooler waters. But mainly it's some drier air that it's running into that's going to be the problem. So here's where Gordon is. I do just want to point out that behind Gordon, there's not really a whole lot of optimism as far as more development. So I guess that's good that we're not seeing that Saharan dust playing a role in that look how thick it is still coming off of the coast. So that's going to of Africa. That's going to keep more things from forming. But here's that rotation. This is where we're finding Gordon right now. And this is going to continue to bring in some of that dust. It's going to bring in some of that drier air. And it just makes it hard for Gordon to continue to progress. What I want to point out, as we look at this peak of hurricane season officially on September, the 10th, we're certainly past that. But what happens if you actually look at the numbers? So when we say the peak of the season, this is where we would see the most activity at one point within the season. But from this point forward in time, we have again about 50% of the actual activity that takes place. It's in a shorter amount of time as it builds up. So even though we've talked about reaching the peak in a normal season, that means a normal season has 14 named storms. That's what the average is. 14 named storms within a hurricane season. And so by now, we typically have what's left. We I should say. So what's left? We would typically have seven more at least to form. So we still expect this to be a busier than average season. So hang on everybody. Basically what I'm saying is do not be surprised if we still have 7 to 10 more named storms before this season is over. Just looking at the numbers, looking at those expectations that are out there, it's still something that could be taking place as, again, a normal average season has 14 named storms. We've had seven of those so far. Right. So Gordon is where we are right now. Helene will be the next one. So if that East Coast area develops into a tropical system, that's the name you're going to be hearing. Helene will be the next one that's formed. Just a quick reminder. We always want to be prepared for hurricane season, whether we're in the beginning of it, middle of it, end of it. Always want to have our preparations ready. A great way to do that is to go to my YouTube channel. If you go to YouTube, maybe you're there already watching this video, go to the search bar in YouTube and put in meteorologist John Dawson that's going to get you to my channel. And I've got all my hurricane gear tests that are there helping you think about what you might need to do in preparation. So we're talking about food and water and flashlights and ways to charge your cell phone, first aid kits, other things that are going to be necessary as part of your hurricane preparations. Again, Meteorologist John Dawson in the search bar for YouTube. That's going to be a great way for you to find that we will be back here again tomorrow and every other day of Hur