Tropical cyclone heads to Nicaragua

NICARAGUA (KXAN) -- On Friday, Julia became the tenth named storm of the Atlantic season. It is the only tropical cyclone being watched at this time.

Saturday's late-morning advisory from the National Hurricane Center indicated the winds are up to 65 mph with gusts up to 75 mph. The tropical storm will become a hurricane this afternoon as the winds increase to 80 mph. The storm is racing west through the Caribbean at over 20 mph.

It is forecasted to weaken a little prior to landfall approximately north of Bluefields, Nicaragua, early Sunday morning. Storm surge is forecasted to be up to 4 to 6 feet for the coast of Nicaragua.

Rainfall totals of 6 to 12 inches could be realized for San Andres and Providencia and 5 to 10 inches or higher are predicted for Nicaragua. This creates a potential for life-threatening flash floods and mudslides into the early part of the week.

Further weakening takes place over land with winds dropping off to around 45 mph Sunday afternoon/night.

The National Hurricane Center is reporting that a Hurricane Warning is in effect for the islands of San Andres and Santa Catalina along with Nicaragua's coast from Bluefields north to Puerto Cabezas. Tropical storm warnings are along the rest of Nicaragua's Caribbean coastline as well as the Pacific coast of Honduras and Nicaragua.

By Monday morning, it will be off the coast of San Salvador heading to the Pacific.

Will it keep the same name if it moves into the Pacific? Or, will it get a new name? The best answer starts with it depends on what happens to the storm. The National Hurricane Center has a policy stating that if an Atlantic basin storm (including the Caribbean and Gulf) moves over land and then into the Pacific the name remains the same.

On the flip side if a tropical cyclone degenerates in the Atlantic, Caribbean or Gulf but "the remnants survive into the Pacific" it will be given another name given that no crossover happened.