By Brad Brooks
Oct 7 (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Isaias formed in the Gulf of Mexico on Wednesday and is forecast to strengthen into a hurricane before slamming into the southern US coast early on Saturday, the National Hurricane Center said.
The storm is forecast to pass through areas with significant offshore oil and gas production, along with onshore refining facilities, which could pressure inventories and already-high prices at the pump.
About 11.2 million barrels of oil production could be lost
across the Gulf through the duration of the storm, a marked increase from the 7.1 million barrels impacted by Tropical Storm Bertha in July, according to a model forecast from consulting firm Earth Science Associates.
The NHC expects Isaias to develop into a hurricane by Thursday as it quickly picks up power over the warm Gulf waters before making landfall early Saturday, most likely somewhere along the Mississippi, Alabama or Florida panhandle coast. The storm was located about 500 miles south of the Louisiana coast early Wednesday.
Isaias could produce isolated rainfall amounts of 10 inches across parts of the Gulf Coast, stretching from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle, the NHC said in its latest bulletin.
The storm could also produce 3 inches or more of rain further inland, with the NHC warning that "flash and urban flooding, along with isolated river flooding, will be possible" across the Southeast.
Isaias is expected to run into strong upper-level winds, known as vertical wind shear, in the final 24 hours before it reaches the northern Gulf Coast, which could weaken the storm.
Still, the NHC says that it's “looking more likely that Isaias will be a significant hurricane when it reaches the coast.”
(Reporting by Brad Brooks in Colorado and Sukanya Mitra in Bengaluru; Editing by David Goodman and Aurora Ellis)
