Tropical wave sits off the North Carolina coast as Tropical Storm Paulette, Rene strengthen

RALEIGH, N.C. -- Four tropical systems, including two named storms and two tropical waves, are developing in the Atlantic storm basin.

The closest of those systems is located about 400 miles southeast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina.

That system only has a 30 percent chance to become a tropical depression. However, even if it fails to strengthen, it will continue to push moisture on shore in North Carolina. The system is already causing scattered showers and will continue to do so for the next several days.

Next, Tropical Storm Paulette is located about 1,200 miles east of the northern Leeward Islands. Paulette has maximum sustained winds of 60 miles per hour.

Paulette is headed toward Bermuda, arriving sometime early next week. At this time, the tropical storm is still expected to stay away from the US coast.

Preparing your hurricane kit during COVID-19

Since we are still dealing with COVID-19 during hurricane season your hurricane kit might look a little different this year.

Tropical Depression Rene, which was previously Tropical Storm Rene, is located about 500 miles west-northwest of the Cabo Verde Islands with sustained winds of 35 miles per hour.

Rene is moving west at 14 mph. It is expected to become a tropical storm again later Wednesday. Then on Thursday, Rene will likely become a hurricane.

The good news is, Rene is expected to turn north and fizzle out without making landfall.

Finally, a new tropical wave is developing over Africa. This new system has an 80 percent chance to become a tropical depression in the next five days. This system is still too far out to forecast with any accuracy or confidence.

This has been an extremely active hurricane season. In fact, we're on pace to break the record for the number of named storms in a season.

Rene is the most recent storm this season to break a record. It along with all the following storms set records as the earliest of their respective first letters to ever form: Cristobal, Edouard, Fay, Gonzalo, Hanna, Isaias, Josephine, Kyle, Laura, Marco, Nana, Omar, and Paulette.

What happens when we run out of letters of the alphabet for hurricane names?

It turns out the list starts over, with the Greek Alphabet. We'll look at the first six names on that list: