Heavy Rains Possible in Coming Week, But Hurricane Threat Remains Low

As the 2023 Hurricane season peaks this week, storm threats to Florida appear to be at low ebb. Conditions in the tropical Atlantic basin are continuing to deflect storms northward.

As once powerful Hurricane Lee makes landfall on the coasts of Maine and Nove Scotia, Floridians breathed a sigh of relief. At is peak the storm reached the much-feared Category Five intensity, but Florida received nothing more than dangerously high surf and beach erosion.

This week the first of a series of weak cold fronts is expected to push into Florida, eventually stalling draped across the central part of the state. That boundary will become a focus of rain and thunderstorms through early next week, when a second front is expected to pile on additional moisture. The official forecasts from National Weather Service offices in Ruskin and Melbourne agree that sea-breeze collisions over the central part of the state will be the triggers for most of the weather activity in a low wind-flow environment.

Rain will be welcomed by many, as the year has so far produced a rainfall deficit over the Lake Wales Ridge area and many areas of the Gulf Coast of Florida. Volunteers from Lake Wales Heritage, who have been planting trees since May in anticipation of a normal summer monsoon season have been disappointed as some new plantings have withered in extreme temperatures and dry conditions, despite watering efforts. Likewise, citrus growers and other farming operations have been forced to turn on irrigations systems during what are normally wet months.