Tropical Storm Dolly has erupted in the Atlantic Ocean, with early forecasts warning that the cyclone could head directly toward the East Coast of the United States.
The weather system bypassed the initial stage of cyclone development, known as a tropical depression, and rapidly reached sustained winds exceeding 40mph, according to officials. The National Hurricane Center announced that the system officially became a tropical storm at 11am Eastern Time on Thursday.
Early forecasting models show a strong likelihood that Dolly will move directly toward Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Spaghetti models, which track all potential paths of tropical storms and hurricanes, show multiple tracks predicting the cyclone will then reach Cuba, the Bahamas, and the Florida coast.
Storm trajectory and coastal advisories
Some tracks from the American Global Forecast System model suggested Dolly could push as far north as the Carolinas. Forecasters emphasize that forecasting models can shift dramatically once storms form and move closer to making landfall.
Officials from the National Hurricane Center noted that Dolly may be a short-lived tropical storm if it encounters strong wind shear in the Atlantic that prevents it from intensifying into a hurricane. However, forecasters at AccuWeather warned that a path exists for the cyclone to navigate the turbulent Atlantic air and grow into a larger storm closer to the eastern United States.
AccuWeather lead hurricane expert Alex DaSilva said in a statement: "If Dolly can survive the dry air, wind shear and land interaction near the islands, the environment does become more conducive for development and strengthening off the Southeast coast mid-to-late next week."
Heavy rainfall is expected to begin affecting the Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, and Hispaniola this weekend. Hispaniola is the Caribbean island shared by Haiti and the Dominican Republic.
Puerto Rico is currently ranked as having the highest risk from tropical rain and severe wind from August 27 through September 9, according to AccuWeather. The commercial weather service added that the entire East Coast and Gulf Coast also face a low risk of tropical rain and wind from the approaching storm, with warnings stretching from Texas to Maine.
DaSilva added: "There is certainly a chance for this wave to bring rain to the southeastern US one way or another. The question is in what form?"
Storm naming and El Nino impact
The naming of the storm just days after the death of legendary country music singer Dolly Parton was purely coincidental, officials noted. The lists of named storms for each Atlantic hurricane season are publicly released years in advance, and the National Hurricane Center has already announced names for tropical storms and hurricanes that could form through 2031.
Meteorologists pointed out that while Dolly found a narrow corridor in the Atlantic that allowed it to grow into a large, organized cyclone, the global impact of a Super El Nino has quieted what is usually a busy hurricane season.
An El Nino pattern forms when the surface temperature of the Pacific Ocean becomes noticeably warmer than its historical average. A Super El Nino occurs when those temperatures rise by more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit, or 2.0 degrees Celsius. This shift alters weather patterns worldwide, causing more hurricanes to form in the Pacific while preventing Atlantic storms from gathering strength by producing increased wind shear and drier air that tears apart cyclone structures.
Atlantic hurricane season forecasts
Dolly is only the fourth named Atlantic storm to develop this year, despite the Atlantic hurricane season officially beginning three months ago. The season runs annually until November 30.
In contrast, 12 named storms have already developed in the Pacific Ocean this summer, including multiple storms that impacted the Hawaiian Islands. The National Hurricane Center is currently not tracking any other potential storms across the Atlantic that could form within the next seven days.
The last tropical storm to form before Dolly was Cristobal on August 12, but that cyclone held its strength for only a single day and never approached the United States.
Long-range forecasters recently downgraded their predictions for the 2026 Atlantic hurricane season due to the emergence of the Super El Nino. As of July 7, AccuWeather revised its prediction to between eight and 14 named storms in the Atlantic this year, down from an earlier forecast of 11 to 16 issued in March.
However, the forecasting company still expects four to seven of those storms to reach hurricane strength, and predicts that three to five named storms will make landfall in the United States.
AccuWeather lead long-range forecaster Paul Pastelok told the Daily Mail in June: "It only takes one storm, and then boom! We're not saying that El Nino is going to weaken and dampen the Atlantic Basin season completely."
Pastelok added: "There's still a lot of warm water, a lot of potential there. So, [I] just wanted to make sure [if] people were saying, 'Oh, we don't have to worry about anything this year.' That's not true. It only takes one storm."
