Waterlogged weekend
Heavy rain, high tides will make for a wet South Florida
Heavy rain from a passing tropical wave will drench South Florida over the next two days, with the impact worsened in coastal neighborhoods by the simultaneous arrival of unusually high tides.
Hit hardest will be coastal Broward and Palm Beach counties, with rainfall totals expected of three to five inches, according to the National Weather Service. But there is a chance rains could be even heavier, with the possibility of up to eight inches in some areas, the weather service said.
Worsening the impact of the rains will be high tides that will peak between 9 and 10 a.m. as well as 9 and 10 p.m.
The high-tide flooding
will be minimal, and at any other time might have barely been noticed. They will not be high enough to cause “sunny day flooding” that brings water into the streets of Miami Beach, parts of Fort Lauderdale and other coastal areas (not that anyone’s expecting sunny days any time soon).
But the high tides associated with the new moon
could make it difficult for storm sewer systems to function effectively, allowing water to linger on streets and sidewalks.
“When we get heavy rainfall on top of high tides, it makes it harder for these areas to drain,” said Arlena Moses, meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
The weather system that’s bringing all this rain is a tropical wave drifting across
the Bahamas.
Although tropical waves can strengthen into tropical storms or hurricanes, this one is given almost no chance to get stronger or more organized, according to the National Hurricane Center.
Of greater concern is a patch of stormy weather in the middle of the Atlantic, which is given a 70% chance of strengthening and organizing itself into a tropical depression, the first step toward becoming a tropical storm or hurricane.