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Bertha Forms Off Africa

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Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Published: July 4, 2008

Already, Bertha is one for the history books: the earliest tropical storm to form off the African coast since records began in 1967.

The thunderstorm took the title early Thursday afternoon, also becoming the second named storm of this year's Atlantic hurricane season.

Forecasters should know by early next week whether the storm will pose a threat to land.

Two of the handful of computer models show Bertha growing into a hurricane in the next two to seven days, but National Hurricane Center forecasters expect it will remain a tropical storm at that point.

Although the computer models favored by the United States show Bertha turning north before it threatens land, British models show it continuing on a path that would be more likely to hit Florida.

The National Hurricane Center puts Bertha 700 to 800 miles northeast of Puerto Rico by Tuesday morning.

Forecasters are waiting to see whether the air pressure system steering Bertha pulls the storm north or whether Bertha will be picked up by a different pressure system that will push it west, where it would be more likely to threaten land.

The storm has been nurtured by above-average water temperatures off the African coast and an unseasonable lack of wind shear, which stops hurricanes from forming.

But as the storm travels across the Atlantic, wind shear is expected to pick up and water temperatures will be slightly cooler.

The storm's chance of becoming a hurricane could be quashed by those factors. Or the storm could stay alive and move slowly until reaching warmer water in the western Atlantic, where it could regroup and intensify.

"We don't expect it to strengthen very quickly," said Daniel Brown, a hurricane specialist with the National Hurricane Center. "For the next few days the main limiting factor will be the water temperatures further out in the Atlantic. They're just warm enough for tropical cyclone development."

Storms from off the coast of Africa account for 85 percent of major hurricanes.

Tropical Storm Arthur, the first of this year's hurricane season, formed in May, the day before the season officially began, and drenched the Yucatan Peninsula.

On Thursday, Bertha was traveling about 14 mph with sustained winds of 40 mph and gusts up to 50 mph. To be classified as a hurricane, the storm would need to reach sustained winds of 74 mph.

The last storm named Bertha formed in 1996 on the evening of July 4. Until today, that Bertha held the record for forming earliest in the season so far east.

The 1996 storm turned northwest, making landfall in North Carolina.

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