Tropics die down, but hurricane center tracking Atlantic system

The bubbles of concern around the Atlantic basin have died down for the National Hurricane Center, which a day ago had been tracking three systems with the potential to form into the season’s next tropical depression or storm.

As of the 8 p.m. tropical outlook Wednesday, though, the NHC’s focus now has shifted to a sole investigation in the Atlantic as systems near Florida and in the Caribbean fell apart since Tuesday.

The remaining area of focus is a tropical wave that emerged this week off the coast of Africa and is now located just southwest of the Cape Verde Islands.

“Some development of this system is possible later this week and into the weekend while it moves westward to west-northwestward over the tropical Atlantic,” forecasters said.

Its seven-day forecast shows it potentially parked near the northeastern Leeward Islands and a path that could bring it closer to the Bahamas and Florida.

The NHC gives is a 40% chance to form into a tropical system in the next week.

If it spins up to namedstorm intensity it would become Tropical Storm Emily.

The last named storm, Hurricane Don, petered out on Monday in the north Atlantic after more than a 10-day run keeping forecasters busy, even though it was never a threat to land.

While that storm died down, the NHC had been eyeing a tropical wave that moved into the Caribbean this week and another system southwest of Bermuda that had been potentially targeting Florida.

The existence of upperlevel winds because of the effects of El Niño spilling into the Caribbean and the dampening effect of Saharan dust over the Atlantic are two reasons the parade of tropical waves lately have not had much luck at growing into anything stronger despite warmer than normal ocean temperatures.

The season has had four named systems since it officially began June 1 with three tropical storms and one hurricane. The hurricane season runs through Nov. 30.