The National Hurricane Center is, as of the afternoon of Aug. 9, tracking Invest 97L as it moves across the eastern and central Atlantic.
Forecasters said the system has a medium chance of development into a named storm next week as it moves across the Atlantic. It’s still early to track but some models have the system moving in the direction of the Virgin Islands and St. Maartin.
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Invest 97L is one of two systems being tracked by the National Hurricane Center. Tropical Storm Dexter and a system this week off of North Carolina both dissipated late this week.
The next named storms of the 2025 Atlantic hurricane season will be Erin and Fernand.
Historically, the fifth-named storm in the Atlantic develops Aug. 22, with the first hurricane developing Aug. 11. The last three storms in the Atlantic have formed ahead of historical averages.
Spaghetti models for Invest 97L. See expected path
Special note about spaghetti models: Spaghetti model illustrations include an array of forecast tools and models, and not all are created equal. The Hurricane Center uses only the top four or five highest performing models to help make its forecasts.
What is an invest?
Short for investigation, the National Hurricane Center uses the term invest for areas of low pressure it is monitoring for potential development into a tropical depression or storm.
Invests are not tropical depressions or tropical storms. They’re usually clusters of showers and thunderstorms, and just because they’ve been designated as an invest does not guarantee they’ll strengthen into a tropical storm or hurricane.
Invests run from 90 to 99, followed by a letter: L for the Atlantic basin and E for those in the eastern Pacific. After 99, it starts over again and the next invest would be 90.
Once something has been designated as an invest, specialized data sets and computer models can begin, including scheduling Hurricane Hunter aircraft missions and running spaghetti models.
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➤ National Hurricane Center tracking Invest 96L. See the latest forecast
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This article originally appeared on Naples Daily News: Invest 97L spaghetti models, tracker and path map