Once Francine fizzles out after pushing from the Gulf Coast into the Southeast, forecasters are already watching the potential for more development just a few days later.
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00:00There are some other tropical things that we want to keep an eye on. So for a look at what else is
00:04going on in the tropics, we're now joined by our hurricane expert Alex Da Silva. Alex, good to see
00:09you. I know that there's been a lot to track over the past week after a period of inactivity. We're
00:14back in business here with a lot going on. So what are you most concerned about beyond the, at least
00:19the scope of Francine? Well, it's certainly been kind of like a tale of two seasons, right? We had
00:24a lot of activity early in the season. Beryl, Debbie, you know, Beryl was the earliest category
00:29five on record. Then we kind of went through a very, very, you know, quiet period across the
00:34Atlantic. Most of those storms on your screen there were very early in the season, right?
00:37So we didn't see too much kind of in the heart of the season. And now that we've kind of crested
00:42over the top of the peak, September 10th is the statistical peak of the hurricane season. Now
00:47we're at the top of the roller coaster. Essentially, we're coming back down the other side.
00:51It does look like things are going to be really ramping up here as we head towards the end of
00:55September and into October. Yeah, there's an unusual stretch here from mid-August to early
01:00September. Quite a spell for that chunk of the calendar since 1968. But Alex, we do have a little
01:05bit more activity. And again, not every storm is going to have the same impact to actual people,
01:09but there's a new tropical depression that formed yesterday farther to the east.
01:13Yeah, this is likely to become Gordon a little bit later today. That is the next name on the
01:18list here. We're watching a couple of tropical waves coming across the Atlantic. Good news for
01:22this one. While it will likely become Gordon either later today or tonight, it does look like
01:27it's going to go safely out to sea here with no impacts to the U.S. That's certainly some good
01:31news there, and you can see it hooking eventually to the north, as you mentioned. But closer to home,
01:36you know, a lot of the time it's the early season when we see storms develop within maybe 500 miles
01:42of the U.S. coast. Here we are in mid-season, and we may be dealing with a little bit of activity
01:47off the Carolina coast. Yeah, it's a little bit weird. We're usually looking much further out in
01:51the Atlantic this time of year, but again, homegrown development can still happen any time
01:55of the year, and so we're going to be watching off the southeast coast the end of this weekend
01:59into the beginning of next week. Under that belly of that high pressure, there's going to be a
02:03stalled frontal boundary, and even a little bit of energy from Francine is going to actually come
02:08off the southeast coast, so we could see some development again. That would be Sunday, Monday,
02:12or Tuesday of next week here. Okay, we'll keep a close eye on that situation, and whether it's
02:18organized and gets designated a name or not, there is potential for some very heavy rain out
02:23there, and we are very concerned about impacts, obviously. So, Alex, big picture, big picture,
02:30beyond this system, where do we expect to go for the rest of the season? Yeah, well, we expect the
02:34rest of the season to be pretty active. It does look like that dry air that's really been holding
02:38the season back is going to kind of, you know, stay on the lower side for the rest of the season.
02:43The wind shear is probably going to be a little bit less. We're starting to finally get into that
02:48La Nina pattern that we've been talking about all season, so I would expect a fairly active
02:53rest of the hurricane season. We're still calling for four to six total impacts on the United States,
02:59so we've already seen three, so we still have a couple more to go, I think, for the rest of
03:03the hurricane season. And for the overall number of named storms, not every year really fits a
03:08clean bell curve. We might have kind of like a two-humped camel this year here with some early
03:13season and late season activity. Alex DiSilva, we always appreciate your insight here. He is
03:17the master of hurricanes here and AccuWeather's lead hurricane expert. Good stuff, Alex.