Last Friday it was not even a named storm. Today Sally is a tropical storm which is expected to become a hurricane on Monday and make landfall as a category 2 hurricane near New Orleans sometime on Tuesday morning. It is a slow mover, which means that it will pile up a lot of storm surge and rain along the coast as it moves towards land. Alabama is the state in the Southeast that is most likely to be affected by Sally now that it is well out over the Gulf (Florida got a lot of rain this past weekend, including the second wettest day ever for Key West).

As Sally comes on shore, it is expected to move north and then northeast over the next few days. It will weaken as it moves inland but could still bring a lot of rain to the area. Large parts of Alabama could see between four and ten inches, and amounts of up to 15 inches could occur near the coast. Later in the week, northern Georgia could see isolated areas of up to six inches and maybe even more in the mountains. By the time it gets over Georgia late Thursday night it will be a post-tropical depression but could still bring some gusty winds to the region. Before then we can expect squally weather and potentiallly some isolated severe weather as Sally brings a lot of moist air into the region. The driest areas are going to be the eastern Carolinas and Virginia.

Meanwhile, Hurricane Paulette is expected to pass over Bermuda in the next day, TD Rene is winding down in the central Atlantic, TD 20 is expected to become a named storm “Teddy” soon (it should not affect us but move north), and the National Hurricane Center is watching a couple of other areas of possible development over the next few days. Welcome to the peak of the Atlantic tropical season!