A system off the coast of Africa, which the NHC had been monitoring
for several days, was upgraded to tropical depression status on August 21 and
designated as Tropical Depression Four. Consequently, a tropical storm warning
was immediately issued for the Cape Verde islands, as the system threatened to
pass over or near the southern part of the archipelago. However, the system
failed to strengthen into a tropical storm before passing the chain of islands,
and the warning was discontinued the following morning.
The depression was upgraded to a tropical storm and was named Debby late on August 22. While it had been expected to strengthen into a hurricane, this never occurred and Debby weakened into a tropical depression on August 26. It continued to the north and lost tropical characteristics on August 27.
On
about July 26, a vigorous tropical wave formed off the coast of Africa and
slowly tracked westward. It slowly developed due to poor environmental
conditions and it became a tropical depression late on July 31 about
160 miles (260 km) east of Antigua. The depression soon strengthened
further and was named Tropical Storm Chris six hours later. National Hurricane
Center forecasters dismissed some computer models, which dissipated Chris
quickly, as they did not have a handle on the strength of the storm.
Tropical Storm Chris moved to the northwest and gradually strengthened before reaching its peak strength on August 2 with winds of 65 mph (100 km/h), when it was to the northeast of the United States Virgin Islands. The storm was forecast to strengthen further and become a hurricane as it moved into the Bahamas.
In response to the storm's projected path into the Gulf of Mexico, prices for crude oil rose on the New York Mercantile Exchange in London. Natural gas prices rose considerably in New York Mercantile Exchange electronic trading on August 2. Anticipation of a threat to supply by a potential Hurricane Chris coupled with high demand during an ongoing heat wave are cited as reasons for the price move. On August 2 approximately 600 tourists evacuated the Puerto Rican islands of Vieques and Culebra as tropical storm warnings had been issued. Cruise lines such as Royal Caribbean re-routed their ships to avoid the storm.
In Puerto Rico, rainfall from the storm caused the Fajardo River to overflow its banks. The overflown waters temporarily closed a highway in the northeastern portion of the island. Rainfall reached up to 2 inches (50 mm) across portions of Hispaniola, the Turks and Caicos, the Bahamas, and eastern Cuba, and reached 4 inches (100 mm) in some mountainous areas. Source.
Tropical Storm Beryl (2006)
In
mid-July, a front moved off the east coast of the United States and stalled,
spawning a series of low pressure areas. Because steering currents were weak,
the most southerly disturbance slowly drifted to the south, and gradually became
more organized a few hundred miles east of the North Carolina coast. On the
morning of July 18, the low pressure area was designated the second tropical
cyclone of the season, ending more than a month of inactivity in the Atlantic
Basin. That afternoon, the depression was upgraded to Tropical Storm Beryl.
Intensity: 60 mph (95 km/h), 1001 mbar
Beryl continued moving to the north until it turned to the northeast on July 20. Beryl paralleled the East Coast of the United States and crossed over Nantucket island before becoming extratropical southwest of Nova Scotia on July 21. Source.
On June 10,
an area of disturbed weather associated with a broad low pressure area off the
coast of Belize organized over the warm waters of the Caribbean Sea and became
the first tropical depression of the season. Southwesterly vertical wind shear
was a constant companion to this system, but as it moved closer to Florida, the
depression strengthened into a tropical storm on the morning of June 11. Passing
over the warm deep water of the Loop Current allowed accelerated development,
and the cyclone's maximum sustained winds increased to its peak strength of
70 mph (115 km/h), just shy of hurricane strength. Subsequent
weakening occurred as it moved over the cooler waters of the continental shelf.
Intensity:70 mph (110 km/h), 995 mbar
Alberto made landfall midday on June 13, about 50 miles (85 km) southeast of Tallahassee, Florida. Alberto brought a storm surge of five feet to the Big Bend area of the Florida coastline, flooding areas of Cedar Key and Crystal River. The large system was slow to weaken, moving across Georgia and the Carolinas before being downgraded to a tropical depression early on June 14. Alberto became an extratropical storm that morning while quickly moving towards the coast. Ex-Alberto strengthened rapidly offshore New England and the Canadian Maritimes, becoming an oceanic storm by the afternoon of June 15, 2006. Source.
