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Caribbean Wave Frets Forecasters More Than New Storm Nana

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By NEIL JOHNSON | The Tampa Tribune

Published: October 13, 2008

tampa - As Tropical Storm Nana weakened today, another tropical depression formed in the Caribbean Sea and forecasters expect it to become the season's next hurricane.

Fortunately, neither is expected to move close to the United States, though Puerto Rico could be hit as the Caribbean storm heads east into the Atlantic Ocean. By then, the tropical depression could be close to hurricane strength.

So far this year each of the 14 previous tropical depressions that formed became a named storm. Six went on to become hurricanes.

Rain bands from the depression should reach Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands today.

Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center said the season's 15th tropical depression formed a few hundred miles southwest of Puerto Rico and is expected to meander there the next day or so, moving at only about 2 mph.

It should finally begin heading to the northeast on Wednesday, forecasters say.

Conditions aren't entirely favorable for development but are just good enough to allow the depression to become a tropical storm by Tuesday. It would be called Omar.

Forecasters say, though, they are far from certain about their prediction of how strong the storm will become.

If the depression becomes a hurricane, it would barely qualify; the hurricane center expects its winds to top at minimum hurricane strength.

By Saturday, it should be in the Atlantic east of Jacksonville.

Nana weakened to a tropical depression today as forecasters expected. In a day or so it should be just an area of low pressure in the middle of the Atlantic.

Added to two depressions, forecasters started watching a disturbance in the western Caribbean and another about 1,100 miles west of the Cape Verde Islands in the Atlantic.

The Caribbean disturbance about 100 miles east of Nicaragua could form the hurricane season's 16th tropical depression by Tuesday, forecasters say.

Conditions are favorable for it to develop as it moves slowly to the west or northwest. A hurricane hunter aircraft is scheduled to fly through the disturbance on Tuesday.

The disturbance in the Atlantic has become more organized but forecasters don't expect it to last long before merging with what's left of Nana.

Reporter Neil Johnson can be reached at (813) 259-7731 or njohnson@tampatrib.com.

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