On Tuesday afternoon, the National Hurricane Center issued its first advisory on Tropical Depression 11 in the Atlantic Ocean.  As of early Wednesday evening, the storm was located 1,220 miles east-southeast of the northern Leeward Islands.  The latest update has the maximum sustained winds still at 35 mph with a continued movement toward the west at around 15 mph.  Central storm pressure was recorded to be at 1007 millibars.

Tropical Depression 11 is forecast to strengthen into Tropical Storm Josephine on Wednesday night.  This will be the 10th named storm in the Atlantic basin during the 2020 hurricane season.  The storm is forecast to eventually get “pulled” into the wind flow associated with high pressure near Bermuda, steering the storm just north of the Lesser Antilles and Puerto Rico by the weekend.  By early next week, the storm is expected to be east of the Bahamas as a weak tropical storm or depression.

According to the National Hurricane Center, wind shear is expected to back off through Thursday and Friday.  This should allow the storm to become better organized, thus gaining tropical storm status as well as strengthening the wind field.  Heading into the weekend, however, the storm is expected to encounter stronger wind shear.  This will lead to the storm weakening.  Many global models indicate the wind shear this weekend may be strong enough to weaken it back to a tropical depression.

Of course, changes can occur with these complex tropical cyclones.  We encourage you to stay up-to-date with WeatherNation for all of the latest on this storm.