Claudette is heading out to sea while there’s a new disturbance to watch in the tropics

It’s back to Tropical Storm Claudette. Winds of 40 mph were measured just off the coast of North Carolina, so the system rated the upgrade from tropical depression to tropical storm. The center of circulation will move off into the Atlantic today, and leftover gusty downpours will exit the Carolina and Virginia coast. Claudette’s story will likely end tomorrow over the North Atlantic.

Claudette continues to have a fringe effect on South Florida’s weather. Its outer circulation is adding some moisture to the atmosphere, and the system’s low pressure effectively puts a dent in the end of the Atlantic high-pressure system, which creates the typical ocean breeze.

Both of these effects add to the chance of thunderstorms over the southern Florida peninsula today. When Claudette dies in the North Atlantic tomorrow, the high should restrengthen pushing the afternoon storms farther inland.

Elsewhere, between the Caribbean islands and Africa, a small tropical disturbance has flared up. It’s caught in the strong east-west flow, which will sweep it toward the Caribbean Sea.

The disturbance has a fairly short window of time to organize into at least a tropical depression before upper-level winds are forecast to become hostile. By the end of the week, when the disturbance is approaching the islands, the computer forecast models say the atmospheric conditions will no longer be conducive for development. Overall, its chances of development appear low.

The current expectation is that the disturbance will move through the islands as a moisture surge late in the week.

Elsewhere, robust disturbances are forecast to move off of Africa over the next couple weeks, but Saharan Dust and somewhat hostile atmospheric conditions will keep them tame for now, according the long-range computer forecast models. We’ll see.