We're just weeks away from the start of South Florida's wet season. Which, not to bum everyone out, means it's almost time for our daily mid-afternoon rain showers. Meteorologists predict that this summer could see even more rainfall than average this year. In terms of water levels and such, that's good news after a rather dry winter and spring, but, you know, it's a bummer otherwise.
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via NOAA

SWEET JESUS

Between the front-page Miami Herald story, the endless meteorologists on the morning news and the Facebook and Twitter-choking freakout by basically everyone you know, you'd think hurricane season had officially arrived. Not quite. But it is going to rain for FOUR STRAIGHT DAYS in Miami.

It's the rainpocalypse! Will you and your family survive?!
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Congratulations! You survived Emily, Irene, Rina, and all those other storms that threatened to come near us, yet never did. Yes, we've endured another hurricane season, and we won't even have to think about any possible category fives until next June. More >>

Yesterday it seemed that Rina was poised to reach category three strength winds with an eventual turn near South Florida. Today, Rina has dissipated back to tropical storm status and is now projected come no where near us. Jeez, Rina, what a loser.
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​Slowly moving but quickly strengthening Hurricane Rina is expected to become a Category 3 storm sometime within the next 24 hours as it trudges toward Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. However, the five-day projections have the storm taking a hard right turn later this week, and Miami is now within its possible path. The good news is if the storm does brush South Florida, it's likely to have weakened considerably.
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​Quickly developing Hurricane Rina has now achieved Category 2-strength winds less than a day after becoming a hurricane, and there's no sign she's about to slow down. Forecasters now expect the storm to make a hard right turn, with the Florida Keys in its possible path.
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NOAA

​Rina has now officially reached hurricane-strength winds. The storm is currently trudging slowly off of the coast Honduras in the Caribbean Sea, with Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula. It's way too early to predict with any certainty its ultimate path, but the storm is expected to strengthen over the next few days and some computer models have it headed in the general direction of South Florida.
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​"We are the most vulnerable metropolitan area in the world when it comes to sea level rise," says University of Miami professor Harold Wanless. Sitting in his office, the avuncular geologist paints a bleak picture. Global warming is a fact, and the results are already visible: hurricanes are getting stronger, droughts and floods more frequent. Here in South Florida, waters rose roughly six inches since between 1930 and 1981. That may not sound like much, but it's just the tip of a rapidly melting iceberg.

"Another eight inches and 65 percent of the county's water control structures will fail," says Wanless. Salt water will come seeping across South Florida, destroying crops, corroding cars, and costing billions in damages. But eight inches is nothing, Wanless says. He expects South Florida seas to rise by at least four, probably six, feet by 2100.
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​A tropical storm moving to the northwest in the Atlantic Ocean could send more big wind up North.

Now only an unorganized mess packing 65 mph winds, Tropical Storm Katia is expected to increase to a Category 2 hurricane in the next five days and to head northwest toward North Carolina or perhaps farther north.

There are a lot of factors here. For one, there's some dry air near the swirling mess, which could weaken it. And there's a front that would have to weaken so that the storm could turn. Also, hurricanes tend to drift when they are on a curvy path like this one, so Katia could miss the United States altogether.
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​Thirty-eight kids at a Catholic school in Cocoa Beach appear to be the biggest Florida victims of Hurricane Irene. Strong winds caused by Irene swept through the sleepy beach town yesterday, knocking over a hive of possibly "Africanized" bees, who then attacked the schoolchildren.
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