Florida may see tropical storm conditions by Saturday as a 'disorganized' Fred swirls past Cuba
Downgraded to a tropical depression, Fred was swirling between eastern Cuba and the southeastern Bahamas early Thursday as it made its way toward Florida for a possible weekend landfall.
Following a quiet month in the Atlantic hurricane season, Fred was the first named storm in August. The system drenched the Dominican Republic on Wednesday, knocking out power for hundreds of thousands and creating the potential for mudslides.
The storm weakened as it moved through the Dominican Republic and Haiti, as expected, but it is forecast to regain strength as it moves over the water and slows over the next couple days, forecasters said.
Winds and rain could come to Florida as soon as Friday. Tropical storm conditions are expected by Saturday and multiple landfalls are possible in the state, according to the National Weather Service,
"These conditions are expected to spread northward along portions of the Florida west coast and the Florida Panhandle through Monday, with another landfall in the Panhandle on Monday," said Dennis Feltgen, a National Hurricane Center meteorologist.
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Calling the storm "disorganized," the National Hurricane Center said Fred was centered 40 miles west-southwest of Great Inagua Island in the Bahamas and 80 miles northeast of Guantanamo, Cuba, on Thursday morning. It was moving west-northwest at 16 mph with maximum sustained winds of 35 mph.
On Tuesday, Fred first reached tropical storm status before it brought heavy rains and power outages to Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
About 13,000 customers were without power in Puerto Rico. Preparing for the storm's impacts, Gov. Pedro Pierluisi had closed government agencies on Tuesday, and some gas stations shut down after running out of fuel.
Power outages were more widespread in the Dominican Republic;: About 300,000 customers were in the dark after Fred passed through. Flooding caused part of an aqueduct system to shut down, government officials said, and people in low-lying areas of Santo Domingo were urged to evacuate. Mudslides were still a risk, forecasters warned.
Heavy rains were also expected in the eastern Bahamas, Turks and Caicos and Cuba, and some areas of those islands could get up to 5 inches. Parts of the western Bahamas could see up to 8 inches.
Flooding is also a risk in Florida, which could see 3 to 5 inches of rainfall through Monday in the Keys and South Florida, the hurricane center said.
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The exact path of Fred remains unknown, making predictions about its intensity in Florida tricky, forecasters said. The Hurricane Center's official path places Fred over the eastern Gulf after passing through the Keys.
That would mean additional strengthening as Fred eyes its final landfall in the Big Bend region or panhandle late in the weekend or early next week. But additional interactions with the land would weaken the storm, forecasters said.
Gov. Ron DeSantis urged Floridians on Wednesday to watch for updates on Fred's track but said it remained too early to determine the storm's potential impacts on the state.
Fred was the sixth named storm of the 2021 hurricane season and first in August, breaking a month-long lull after Hurricane Elsa formed July 9.
Contributing: Megan Kearney, Naples Daily News; The Associated Press
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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Fred to bring tropical storm conditions to Florida by Saturday
