Tropical Depression 28 formed Saturday evening a couple hundred miles south of far western Cuba. It should soon become Tropical Storm Zeta – the 27th named storm of the 2020 season (ties 2005 for most on record).

Intensity increases will likely be slow to take place over the next day or two, as the system slowly gets organized. Once it has a little more structure to work with, additional strengthening should take place near the Yucatan and in the southern Gulf. It’s possible Zeta becomes a hurricane. The good news is that the combination of cooler shelf waters and increasing shear should help gradually weaken the storm as it approaches the northern Gulf Coast. That being said, any storm no matter how weak/strong is not great news for an area that have already been hit hard this hurricane season.

The track of Zeta is going to be dictated by both a ridge nosing over Florida, and a fast-moving trough coming out of the southwestern U.S. The exact timing of this trough in regards to when it picks up the storm and races it NNE, will have a big impact on where exactly Zeta will ultimately make landfall. We’ll keep you posted in the coming days, and will be able to talk about specific impacts as confidence increases in the storm’s exact track.

A disturbance in the western Caribbean that we’ve been keeping an eye on the last few days is certainly looking better organized as we head into the weekend. A broad area of low pressure has formed near the Cayman Islands, and has been producing a large area of disorganized showers and storms. This is the hot spot for tropical development in October and needs to be watched closely as we go through the weekend.

A tropical depression seems likely to form over the next couple of days as this slowly drifts in a general northward direction. There has been decent model consensus the last few days with this moving over western Cuba before turning northeast toward South Florida and the Bahamas early next week, however some recent runs are hinting at the possibility of a further west track into the eastern Gulf – which would obviously lead to more widespread impacts across Florida.

For now, just remember that it’s still hurricane season and we’re not done yet. Stay prepared as always. Let’s see how things evolve over the next day or so, and go from there. When/if a storm actually forms, the track and any potential impacts will become more clear. We’ll keep you posted.