As outlined last Friday, a weak cold front is moving through and will become stationary off our coast. This situation in July is notorious for breeding tropical cyclones, with little time to react to them. The National Hurricane Center's outlook from this morning includes a 'Code Orange' area just offshore, indicating a 60 percent chance for a tropical cyclone to form there in the coming days.
The development process will take a while. We currently don't have any well-defined area of low pressure, which would be the first step in the process. The view from weather satellites above shows thunderstorm activity offshore, but nothing organized.
The consensus view from our computer models (with some outliers) is for an area of low pressure to form off the Georgia or North Florida coast on Friday night into Saturday morning and head northward to northeastward, moving into South Carolina, or just offshore and into North Carolina, later on Saturday into Sunday. The alternate ideas from the outliers either take the system further east and have less of an impact on us, or keep the low-pressure area over land, which would prevent tropical cyclone development.
So, confidence overall isn't great right now, but what appears most likely to happen is for this low-pressure area to bring our coastal areas a soaking rain Saturday through Sunday. A storm on this track would have limited time over water to develop, so it would likely remain relatively weak before moving inland and then moving away. However, if it were to organize quickly and become a tropical storm, then we'd have some low-end wind and storm surge concerns along our coast. There may also be a risk of isolated tornadoes if a tropical depression or storm forms and its center moves into South Carolina.
The next name on our Atlantic list for 2025 is Chantal, if it comes to that.
This doesn't look like a situation that will bring major impacts to South Carolina, but there may not be much lead time on the impacts we do see, so stay in touch with the weather and ensure your storm preparations are in place. If you need prep advice, hurricane.sc is the place to go.
Holiday Weekend Outlook
Friday:
Sunny to partly cloudy across the state with only isolated afternoon and evening thunderstorms. The best chance for a thunderstorm will be along the Coastal Plain. Highs will be in the lower to middle 90s except for the 80s near the beaches and in the higher elevations of the northwest. Thunderstorm activity is likely to dissipate before the scheduled start time of the fireworks displays.
Saturday:
Mostly cloudy along the Coastal Plain with showers and thunderstorms becoming likely, it will also turn breezy. Rain may be heavy enough to cause flooding in areas with poor drainage. Elsewhere, partly to mostly sunny. Highs will range from the upper 80s along the Coastal Plain to the lower 90s along and north of I-20.
More showers and thunderstorms, some with heavy rain, are likely along our coast Saturday night. It would turn windy should we see a tropical storm developing off our coast.
Sunday:
We have much lower confidence in Sunday's forecast, as it will depend on the track and forward speed of our offshore disturbance, but this is what looks most likely to me:
Showers and thunderstorms are likely along the Coastal Plain, particularly in the Pee Dee region. Rain could be heavy enough to cause flooding in areas with poor drainage. Further west, a partly sunny day is more likely, but more clouds and showers will cover a larger portion of the state if the disturbance tracks farther west than expected. Highs will be mainly in the mid-80s along the Coastal Plain. Elsewhere, highs will be 85-90, but it would be cooler if clouds and showers are more prevalent. It's also likely to be breezy to windy over the Coastal Plain and perhaps more of the state, depending on how strong our disturbance gets and its track.
We likely return to a more typical summertime setup early next week, with most places seeing upper 80s to lower 90s and the usual scattering of afternoon thunderstorms.