Tropical Storm Warnings are in effect from North Carolina to Delaware as a tropical storm rapidly develops and targets the East Coast over the next few days.
There is currently an area of disorganized showers and thunderstorms situated a few hundred miles east of the Florida Peninsula. As of now, there hasn’t been any official development and hence, the NHC has named it Potential Tropical Cyclone Sixteen. This enables forecasters at the NHC to issue warnings for the East Coast.
If the wind speeds reach 40 mph, it will be considered a subtropical or tropical storm and will be given the name Ophelia from the 2023 Atlantic hurricane list.
Regardless of how it is named, this system is expected to bring 40-plus mph winds, heavy rain, coastal flooding and high surf to portions of the Southeast and mid-Atlantic starting Friday and continuing through the weekend.
As much as 3-5 inches of rain is expected along and near the Interstate 95 corridor stretching into the Northeast. This may lead to flash flooding in some places, especially right along the coast. Wind gusts of 40-50 mph will create a nasty driving rain that will ruin weekend plans for millions of Americans. And major coastal flooding is now expected in some parts of Virginia due to the onshore winds pushing water into vulnerable areas.