A low-pressure area (LPA) entered the Philippine Area of Responsibility early morning yesterday and may bring rains in the eastern section of the country.
The Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) said the LPA was some 735 km east of General Santos City as of 3 p.m. last Sunday.
In a weather forecast on Monday morning, PAGASA weather specialist Daniel James Villamil said they are not ruling out the possibility of the LPA intensifying into a tropical depression.
Nevertheless, he said there is a small chance the LPA, which is embedded with the intertropical convergence zone, will become a tropical depression within 24 hours.
Villamil said the LPA will bring cloudy skies and isolated rain showers and thunderstorms in some parts of Mindanao and Palawan.
“For the next 24 hours, there is a small chance it will become a tropical storm but we are not ruling out the possibility of tropical cyclone formation in the succeeding days,” said Villamil.
Villamil said the LPA is forecast to move northward or northwestward.
If the LPA develops into a tropical depression, it will be named “Auring,” the assigned name of the country’s tropical cyclone for this year.
PAGASA said the country faces an average of 20 tropical cyclones per year, with eight to nine of them crossing the landmass.
“The peak of the typhoon season is July through October, when nearly 70 percent of all typhoons develop,” PAGASA said.
For this year, PAGASA said 10 to 19 tropical cyclones are expected.
