2 storms pose possible double threat to Gulf Coast

Two tropical systems could become almost simultaneous threats to the U.S. Gulf Coast early next week. They could even get sucked into an odd dance around each other. Or they could fall apart as they soak the Caribbean and Mexico this weekend.

Tropical Storm Laura and a depression that is likely to become Tropical Storm Marco have such bad and good environments ahead of them that their futures were not clear Friday. Computer forecast models varied so much that some saw Laura becoming a major hurricane nearing the U.S., while others saw it dissipating.

If both storms survive the weekend, Laura is forecast to head toward the central Gulf Coast around Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and the western Florida Panhandle, while the other system aims at Texas. The National Hurricane Center’s late Friday afternoon forecast pushed both farther west and slowed Laura’s track.

“A lot of people are going to be impacted by rainfall and storm surge in the Gulf of Mexico,” said Joel Cline, the tropical program coordinator for the National Weather Service. “Since you simply don’t know you really need to make precautions.”

Two hurricanes have never appeared in the Gulf of Mexico at the same time, according to records going back to at least 1900, said Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach. The last time two tropical storms were in the Gulf together was in 1959, he said.

Because the hurricane center slowed Laura’s entrance into the Gulf and moved its track westward, the two storms are now forecast to be together in the Gulf on Tuesday, just before the weaker western storm smacks Texas with Laura making landfall a bit less than a day later.

The hurricane center on Friday issued tropical storm warnings for the northern Leeward Islands and Puerto Rico. Laura was forecast to smack Puerto Rico on Saturday

morning, go over or near the Dominican Republic and Haiti late Saturday and Cuba on Sunday.

Laura, which set a record for the earliest 12th named storm of a season, was moving through the northern Leeward Islands on Friday evening, about 250 miles east-southeast of San Juan, Puerto Rico. It had maximum sustained winds of 45 mph and was heading west at 17 mph.