The National Weather Service has issued a hazardous weather outlook for Atlantic coastal waters that could affect the entire Long Island area, including the East End, from Thursday through Tuesday.
While hazardous weather is not expected today, heavy rains and flooding that could cause beach erosion could impact the area over the weekend and through Tuesday, according to David Stark, meteorologist for the National Weather Service office in Upton.
According to the NWS, there is a low potential for a major coastal storm with heavy rainfall, high winds, coastal flooding and beach erosion early next week.
Whether or not the Long Island area will be affected will ultimately depend on the eventual track and evolution of Tropical Cyclone Sandy as it interacts with a deepening upper level low pressure system approaching the East Coast; the storm may just move out to sea and have little impact on the area weather.
"We're just highlighting the potential for some sort of storm system to affect our area this weekend and later next week," Stark said. "We're still looking quite a ways to the future and we don't know what track the potential system may have. It's a complicated situation right now and our forecast confidence is low as to what might happen."
The goal, Stark said, is to make residents aware of the possibility of hazardous weather this weekend and early next week. "Right now, there is no certainty as to what could happen. It's really too early to get into specifics, other than we do see potential," he said.