SerpApi.Org
U.S. Gulf Cost communities are preparing for potential flooding from storm surge and heavy rain with the second named storm of the 2026 Atlantic hurricane season nearing landfall.
Tropical Storm Bertha is expected to hit the U.S. Gulf Coast this week. The current forecast does not show the storm reaching hurricane strength, but it is still expected to bring storm surge and heavy rain to the southern U.S.
Bertha, currently off the coast of Alabama, is expected to make landfall in southeastern Louisiana as a tropical storm Wednesday night. It should weaken to a tropical depression by Thursday night and become a post-tropical cyclone by Saturday morning as it moves inland.
Mississippi Gov. Tate Reeves, R-Miss., gave an update on his state’s storm preparations in an X post Tuesday.
“The State of Mississippi is in contact with local emergency managers, and coastal counties have begun preparing. Resources will be deployed as requested. At this time, no resource requests have been received, and there are no unmet needs,” he wrote.
According to the National Hurricane Center, a tropical storm warning is in effect from the Bay/Gulf County line in Florida to the Terrebonne/Lafourche Parish border in Louisiana. The warning covers the westernmost Florida Gulf Coast, all of Alabama's and Mississippi's Gulf Coast, and most of Louisiana's Gulf Coast.
Peak storm surges of 2 to 4 feet above ground level are expected from the mouth of the Mississippi River to the Mississippi/Alabama border. As the National Hurricane Center explains, storm surge causes “normally dry areas near the immediate coast to be flooded by rising waters moving inland from the shoreline.”
Surges of 1 to 3 feet are possible from the mouth of the Mississippi River to the Vermilion/Cameron Parish border, from the Mississippi/Alabama border to the Alabama/Florida border, along the stretch from Indian Pass, Florida, to the Aucilla River, and around Lake Pontchartrain in Louisiana. A smaller surge of 1 to 2 feet is possible between the Alabama/Florida border and Indian Pass.
A tropical storm watch is in effect west of the Terrebonne/Lafourche Parish border to the Vermilion/Cameron Parish border, as well as for metropolitan New Orleans, Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Maurepas.
The heaviest rainfall, as much as 16 to 20 inches, is expected to stay offshore. Still, the Gulf Coast could see up to 4 to 6 inches in small outlying areas of the Louisiana coast.
Totals of 2 to 4 inches are possible along most of the Louisiana Gulf Coast and around Mobile, Alabama. Inland Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina won’t bear the brunt of the storm but could still see 2 to 4 inches of rain.
Houston and much of the Texas Gulf Coast above Corpus Christi could see 1 to 2 inches. That same range is expected across most of southern Louisiana, including Lake Charles and New Orleans, most of the Mississippi and Alabama Gulf Coasts, eastern Alabama, the Florida Panhandle, the Tallahassee area, and parts of south-central Georgia and South Carolina.
Bertha is the second named storm of the 2026 Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June 1 to Nov. 30. Neither Arthur, the season’s first named storm, nor Bertha reached or is expected to reach hurricane strength, but Gulf Coast states have taken the brunt of both storms.
