By Drew Lerner
Kansas City, October 9 (World Weather Inc.) – A low pressure system produced torrential rain and strong wind along the east-central Florida coast during the weekend causing some damage. Some of the heavy rain fell further inland into citrus and some sugarcane areas, but no damage to the crops was suspected.
The combination of a low pressure center 50 miles southeast of Cape Canaveral, Florida and a strong surface high pressure center over Virginia were combining forces to produce very strong wind along the U.S. Florida coast. The low pressure center and easterly wind also produced some torrential rainfall during the weekend over east-central Florida. Flooding has occurred and will likely continue as the low pressure center moves inland over the Florida Peninsula tonight and Monday.
The low pressure center is not expected to evolve into a tropical or subtropical storm system because of its close proximity to land. The low pressure center is not expected to move very quickly and because of that it will have potential to produce additional heavy rainfall over the next couple of days while slowly drifting to the north. The storm system should eventually move across the Carolinas and up the Atlantic Coast. The greatest rainfall associated with the storm should be much lighter than that of the past few days because of the storms likely position over land which will reduce some of its potential for flooding rainfall, unlike that of the weekend.
Since last Thursday night, the combined easterly wind and developing low pressure center have worked together to produce rainfall of 3.00 to more than 12.00 inches from St. Lucie, northern Okeechobee, Polk and western Hillsborough Counties north to Volusia County. This represents a large portion of east-central and some central crop areas in Florida. Fruits and vegetables come from the region and at least the southern half of the heavy rainfall area is considered a part of the main citrus production region. Osceola and Brevard Counties were the two that Doppler Radar suggested that more than 12.00 inches may have occurred.
World Weather, Inc. does not believe there has been any adverse impact on citrus or sugarcane in Florida. Most of the sugarcane is grown to the south of where the greatest rain fell and the strongest winds occurred. Some impressive wind gusts were reported; including 75mph in Brevard County 2 miles south southeast of Playalinda Beach. Many other wind gusts of 35 to 70 mph were noted, but almost all of them were along the immediate coast and not in citrus areas. If such wind gusts occurred in citrus areas there might have been some fruit droppage, but a full assessment of the wind speeds in crop areas will not be available until Monday.
(1 millimeters-0.04 inch; Celsius-Fahrenheit minus 32 divided by 1.8) End