Tropical Storm Julia (2016)

Tropical Storm Julia was an unexpected system that developed near Florida on September 13th, before rapidly intensifying as it made landfall, moving out into the Atlantic, and meandering for several days before dissipating. Julia was responsible for $6.13 million in damages, but overall had little impact on any land areas, with no fatalities being reported in relation to the cyclone.

The genesis of Julia can be traced to a tropical wave that emerged from the coast of Africa on September 1. Moving quickly westwards, the wave remained disorganised as it passed through the Saharan Air Layer, before suddenly beginning to organise on September 12 as it began to bear down on Florida's Atlantic coast.

Around 0600 UTC on September 13, the NHC upgraded the disturbance into Tropical Depression Eleven with great surprise, not expecting it to develop due to its interaction with land. However, it is estimated that Tropical Storm Julia developed about 3 hours later, which proceeded to quickly attain peak winds of 50 mph as it made landfall in Florida. Besides having moved inland, and persistent shear, Julia was able to remain a tropical storm, with the main convective band on the eastern side of the circulation remaining strong.

Emerging into the Atlantic, Julia became hard to forecast a track for as it got tangled up inside a complicated steering pattern. Over the next several days, Julia meandered erratically over the southeastern Atlantic, before weakening to a tropical depression on September 17 as the shear finally began to take a toll on the system. By the end of September 18, there had been a lack of significant deep convection for long enough to deem Julia a remnant low pressure area, which continued to meander around for about a day before being absorbed by another developing low nearby.