Fred And Grace: Flood Disasters In The Making

Earthquake destruction in Haiti on Saturday. Now, Tropical
Storm Grace is  headed toward the island, which will 
cause even more suffering. 

 Since it's August the Atlantic Ocean tropical storm and hurricane potential is now rising rapidly toward peak season by September. 

There are two tropical systems in the news, neither of which seem at the moment anyway to be destined to become powerhouse hurricanes. But both are potential big time weather disasters. As if we need more. 

The first is former and probably soon to be Tropical Storm Fred. It got wrecked over the past couple of days by unfavorable atmospheric conditions and a tangle with land around Cuba. (Tropical storms tend to fall apart over land, but can strengthen over water).

Zombie Fred was in the southeastern Gulf of Mexico this morning and is expected to return to status as real live Tropical Storm Fred today.  The National Hurricane Center thinks it will come ashore in the western Florida panhandle or southern Mississippi overnight Monday or early Tuesday. 

It'll never really get its act together in terms of high winds. At least that's the current forecast. But it will dump heavy rain from in the Southeast. That seems especially true in the mountains of North Georgia and on into the interior Carolinas.

It's been wet down there lately, so the expected half foot or more of rain this upcoming week in the southern Appalachians sounds like a recipe for dangerous and deadly flash floods.  Stay tuned for that. 

I'm even more worried about Tropical Storm Grace.  

Haiti suffered another terrible earthquake on Saturday. At last report, the 7.2 magnitude quake has already resulted in more than 300 confirmed deaths, and that toll is expected to rise sharply.  There's widespread destruction from the quake in what is already the Western Hemisphere's poorest nation.

Which brings us to Tropical Storm Grace.  Like Fred, Grace is not expected to be a wind powerhouse, at least not in the next few days. But it will pass over or near Haiti tomorrow, with torrential downpours and gusty winds. 

This causes an extreme nightmare for Haiti. For one thing, steep slopes made unstable by the earthquake are prone to land slides in Grace's expected heavy rain, which would lead to more destruction and death in a part of the world that certainly doesn't need it. 

The storm will also surely seriously disrupt relief and rescue operations to the max.  This is basically a worst case scenario.

Like Fred, it seems like Grace will eventually affect Cuba, Florida and maybe other parts of the southeastern United States in the coming days.