Tropical Storm Dean Losing Steam
MIAMI (AP) - Tropical Storm Dean was losing steam early Tuesday, heading away from Newfoundland and toward the Grand Banks in its second dissolution, forecasters said.
Dean, which was reborn Monday days after it was downgraded in the Caribbean to a tropical depression, had been forecast to pass over or just south of Newfoundland.
But Dean was no longer a concern to any land, according to Jack Beven, a hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami.
``It's going to pass south of Newfoundland during the day today, and it'll begin weakening and losing its tropical characteristics as it moves along,'' Beven said before dawn Tuesday. ``There is very little chance of it affecting land as a tropical cyclone.''
The storm was expected to pass over the Grand Banks later in the day.
``Southeastern Newfoundland will get a little rain, but even though they've got the gale force warnings, chances are they won't get a lot of wind,'' Beven said.
The Canadian government still had storm warnings issued Tuesday morning for the southwestern Grand Banks of Newfoundland, and gale warnings up for the remainder of the Grand Banks and southeastern Newfoundland.
At 5 a.m. Tuesday, Dean's top sustained wind was 65 mph, down from 70 mph just six hours earlier. Tropical storms become hurricanes once their top sustained winds reach 74 mph. It was heading northeast at 23 mph.
Dean now was reaching colder water, though, and was expected to weaken and merge with a North Atlantic storm system later Tuesday or early Wednesday, Beven said.
``That depends on how fast it decays as it moves northeastward,'' he said.
Last Wednesday, Dean surprised forecasters as it quickly grew out of a tropical wave, which is weaker than a tropical depression, to reach a top sustained wind of 60 mph. The system flooded parts of Puerto Rico, then weakened back into a tropical depression last Thursday.
A tropical depression becomes a named tropical storm when its top wind reaches 39 mph.
Originally published August 28, 2001.
