Tropical Storm Bill expected to become extratropical cyclone
Hurricane center watching 2 other Atlantic systems
After forming late Monday, Tropical Storm Bill was expected to lose its tropical storm status and dissipate by Wednesday as it heads into cooler waters, the National Hurricane Center said in its 5 p.m. update.
Meanwhile, the NHC is keeping its eyes on two other storms with tropical potential; one is likely to become the next tropical depression toward the end of the week.
First, Bill is moving northeast at a fast 36 mph, and is about 465 miles southeast of Nantucket, Massachusetts, and 290 miles southeast of Halifax, Nova Scotia. Bill has maximum sustained winds of 60 mph, the NHC said. Its tropical-storm-force winds also reach 90 miles from its center.
Bill quickly first formed Monday morning as a tropical depression just off the coast of North Carolina. By Monday night it had reached tropical storm status with maximum sustained winds greater than 39 mph. The NHC expects Bill to weaken Wednesday
morning.
Next, disorganized showers located over the Bay of Campeche and west of the Yucatan Peninsula are associated with a low-pressure area, said Jack Beven, an NHC specialist on Tuesday night. It could
become a tropical depression later this week.
Toward the end of the week the system is forecast to drift toward the center or nonwestern Gulf of Mexico. The hurricane center gave the system a 30% chance of forming into a tropical depression or storm in the next 48 hours and a 80% chance of doing so over the next five days. Heavy rainfall is forecast over Central America and southern Mexico over the next several days.
Also, Beven said in the NHC’s 8 p.m. update that showers and thunderstorms a few hundred miles southwest of the Cabo Islands have continued to diminish so a tropical depression or storm is no longer anticipated.
The next system to become a tropical storm will receive the name, Claudette. The one after that would be named Danny.