While land and air over the United States is cold, the Atlantic Ocean holds a lot of heat and is able to support a tropical system.
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Alex is the first name on the Atlantic’s 2016 hurricane season list of names.
National Hurricane Center forecasters said the system is about 850 miles south-southwest of the Azores. The U.S. National Hurricane Center in Miami said Wednesday that Subtropical Storm Alex could produce powerful winds and heavy rains over the Azores later this week.
Little change in strength is forecast during the next 48 hours, and Alex is expected to become an extratopical cyclone before reaching the Azores on Friday. NOAA’s National Hurricane Center (NHC) noted the development of the extra-tropical low pressure area on Sunday, January 10 at 1:50 p.m. EST.
A subtropical storm is a storm that has some tropical cyclone whirling characteristics, but isn’t as strong as the 39 miles per hour winds that mark a tropical storm. This includes Tropical Storm Ana, which began as a subtropical storm in early May of 2015, eventually transitioning into a tropical system. He also says two other systems developed in December and survived into January: Alice in 1954-1955 and Zeta in 2005-2006.
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The non-tropical low pressure system that formed into Alex was located off the Southeast coast January 7. It is only the fourth known to form in this month in the historical record that begins in 1851.
