Area braces for T.S. Cindy
At press time Wednesday, Tropical Storm Cindy was bearing down on the Gulf Coast, expected to make landfall around the Texas - Louisiana boarder sometime in the early morning hours Thursday.
“Unfortunately, we’re to the east of it,” Lee Hebert, director of parish office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management, said. “The further east you get from it, the more rain you get — and we don’t need any more rain.”
According to Hebert, the National Weather Service in Lake Charles, is predicting anywhere from 4 to 6 inches of accumulated rain, with isolated extreme rain amounts up to 8 to 10 inches, for the Acadia Parish area through Thursday.
“The wind probably won’t be too bad, but we’ll have tropical storm force gusts of 40 to 60 mph Wednesday and Thursday,” Hebert said.
In addition, the NWS has said there is a low risk for tornadoes along the Interstate 10 corridor to the coast.
A tropical storm warning and a flash flood watch is in effect for the entire region, stretching from San Luis Pass, Texas, to the Alabama-Florida border and extending as far north in Louisiana as Alexandria.
Since Cindy is so widespread and most of the heavier rain bands appear to be far off to the east, local forecasters are optimistically predicting that the Acadiana area may be spared the brunt of the storm’s rains.
On Tuesday, Cindy was one of two storms in the Atlantic. Tropical Storm Bret formed on Monday. By Wednesday morning, Bret had dissipated, the victim of wind shears.
This was the first time since 1968 that the Atlantic has had simultaneous storms during the month of June.