Whether Tropical Storm Barry was ever really a tropical storm is a matter of some debate, but at any rate, it’s not anymore: the National Hurricane Center downgraded it to a tropical depression at 11:00 AM and issued its final advisory on the system at 5:00 PM, declaring that it was “rapidly becoming extratropical.” (Margie Kieper says it was extratropical all along.) So what we have now is essentially a June nor’easter that will head up the East Coast this weekend, bringing much-needed rain to various places along the way. This may go down as the least harmful, most beneficial tropical cyclone (or perhaps I should say “tropical cyclone”) in recent years.

Alan Sullivan, however, is slightly alarmed: “Meanwhile tropical storm Barbara is drifting NE toward the mountainous coast of SE Mexico and Guatemala. … Barbara and Barry share a single elongated envelope of tropical moisture and energy. Such storm pairs are common at high season but unusual at this time of year. I find this morning’s satellite a rather disquieting sight. But there were early storms last year also, and it meant nothing.” Indeed. As Dr. Jeff Masters noted yesterday, “There is no relationship between high activity early in hurricane season and high activity during the main August-October peak of the season.”