Tropical Storm Colin forms along Carolina Coast

FORT WAYNE, Ind. (WPTA) - If you’re planning to travel to the southeast coast for the holiday weekend, the third named tropical storm of the Atlantic Hurricane season came to life Saturday morning.

Tropical Storm Colin formed along the Carolina Coast, officially becoming Colin at 5am, according to the National Hurricane Center, and unexpectedly so as the tropical storm wasn’t anticipated to become more organized.

The NHC has issued Tropical Storm Warnings from just north of Charleston, South Carolina up through the Outer Banks of North Carolina, stopping just north of Kitty Hawk.

5am EDT 2 July -- Overnight surface obs, satellite, & radar data indicated Tropical Storm #Colin developed with 40 mph winds.

TS Warnings have been issued for parts of the South & North Carolina coasts as the storm moves NE along the shore this weekend.https://t.co/F55CD3AKBx pic.twitter.com/JHB9dXqrgM
— National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) July 2, 2022

Colin is expected to travel northeast along the coast, eventually going out to see late Sunday night into early Monday morning.

Rainfall doesn’t look like it’ll be a major concern at this time, but localized flooding may be possible in some spots. Winds also not expected to be a big problem. Winds were reported at 40 mph with gusts upwards of 50 mph, but the big concern will be the rip current.

Thanks to Colin’s path paralleling the coast, winds from the northeast side of the storm will come ashore, forming quick, narrow channels of water that will move AWAY from shore.

Tropical Storm Colin Path 07/02/2022(WPTA)

The National Weather Service in Wilmington, North Carolina puts the rip current risk at moderate to high within the entire Tropical Storm Warning area. So, if you have any plans to travel to the beaches of the Carolinas over the weekend, you want to take any local beach advisories seriously.

Fortunately it doesn’t look as if Colin will get much stronger as the storm moves into an area where wind shear is greater, which will cause the storm to become less organized. It also is not expected to have big impacts too far inland.

It wasn’t that long ago that we had only one named storm since the start of the hurricane season, but in the span of about 24 hours we’ve gone up to three.

Atlantic Hurricane Names as of 07/2/2022(WPTA)

Tropical storm Bonnie is currently impacting the Central American countries of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, bringing life-threatening flash flooding to those countries. Bonnie is expected to cross into the Pacific Ocean on Saturday afternoon and clear of land by Sunday.