Hurricane forecasters watching 5 areas

There has not been a named storm in the Atlantic basin for nearly a month, but there are five areas of weather that have the National Hurricane Center's attention, even if their current chances of development are low.

One of them is making rain for the Gulf Coast right now. Forecasters say upper level winds are likely to become even less favorable for the showers and thunderstorms to develop, but they will deliver heavy rainfall for the next day or so.

In the northwestern Atlantic, showers and thunderstorms producing near gale-force winds have become better organized. However, the area of low pressure will encounter colder water by the weekend, and its chances of development in the next two to seven days are a low 30 percent.

In the eastern tropical Atlantic, a trough of low pressure may develop slowly starting early next week, while the disturbance moves slowly northwestward.

The central tropical Atlantic features a tropical wave a few hundred miles off the Leeward Islands, producing limited showers and thunderstorms. Conditions for development could improve next week, but for now, the Hurricane Center's long range forecast gives it a ten percent chance of becoming a depression or named storm.

Showers and thunderstorms in the northwestern Caribbean remain unorganized and development is not expected before the system passes over Belize and the Yucatan peninsula by early Friday. Some development is possible as the system emerges over the Bay of Campeche in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico over the weekend into early next week.