MIAMI - The National Hurricane Center continued to track two tropical waves that those in the Caribbean will be watching closely this week.
Both waves could strengthen into tropical depressions later this week, forecasters said, and conditions will favor them getting more organized.
It is too soon to say if they could affect the continental United States.
The first and closest wave was approaching the Windward Islands on Monday afternoon and was moving quickly westward at 20 mph.
Its quick pace will keep it from developing today and tomorrow as it moves through the Windward and southern Leeward Islands and into the eastern Caribbean.
However, after that the system could slow down, giving it a better chance to get organized.
The hurricane center said a tropical depression could form by the end of the week when the system is in the western Caribbean.
It has a 50 percent chance of becoming a tropical depression over the next five days.
The second system was farther away but had better chances of development.
As of Monday afternoon it was in the eastern Atlantic.
The hurricane center said it could merge with another disturbance south-southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands in the next few days and form a broad area of low pressure.
It is forecast to move to the west to west-northwest at 15-20 mph over the next few days.
Conditions in its path will be more favorable for development, and it could become a depression by mid- to late week, the hurricane center said. It will be in the central to western Atlantic by that point.
That system has a 70 percent chance of becoming a depression in the next five days. That’s up from 60 percent this morning.
The climatological peak of the Atlantic hurricane season is rapidly approaching on Sept. 10, and forecasters are expecting a busy stretch ahead.
NOAA forecasters updated their seasonal Atlantic hurricane forecast recently and are predicting 19-25 named storms before the season ends on Nov. 30.
So far there have been 11 named storms, and two of them have become hurricanes.
