The most destructive and life-threatening aspect of a tropical cyclone is flooding. Debby brings a gigantic area of excessive rainfall and attendant flash flood risk to the Southeast and East U.S. this week. 2-3 feet of rain is possible in parts of the Southeast U.S. as Debby stalls after moving inland.

Preliminary forecast tracks for Tropical Disturbance 97L currently located over Hispaniola are into the northeast Gulf of Mexico this weekend into early next week where water temperatures reach 87F/31C. The HWRF forecast model recognizes the warm water and takes "Debby" into the eastern Florida Panhandle Monday morning as a category 2 hurricane.

Extreme heat and, according to GFS, up to 240 hours with no rain in Arkansas (and vicinity) expect flash drought to develop in the Mid-South U.S. during early August. Some much-needed wet weather may generate in the 11-15-day period to bring slight relief.

Widespread high impact weather to close July primarily centered on an excessive heat event centered on the Mid-south U.S. but forecast to expand through early August. Previously, the mid-August forecast was trending less hot. But overnight, another hot spike appeared in the East U.S. according to the GFS model.