Tropical Storm Arthur spun up off the Texas coast on Thursday, putting a wide stretch of the southeastern US on alert for dangerous, potentially life-threatening flooding, according to the National Hurricane Center.
The storm, the first named system of the 2026 Atlantic hurricane season, was positioned about 60km east-northeast of Port O’Connor, Texas, this morning and was packing maximum sustained winds of 75 km/h.
A tropical storm warning stretches from High Island, Texas, to Morgan City, Louisiana, covering a critical energy corridor lined with major refineries and liquefied natural gas processing plants near Port Arthur and Lake Charles.
Tony Dupont, chief operating officer at Earth Science Associates, said a model based on previous storms indicates roughly 10,000 barrels of oil production could be lost because of shut-ins at offshore platforms in Arthur’s path.
Brad Reinhart, a senior hurricane specialist, monitors the storm at the National Hurricane Center
The Gulf Coast refining belt from Corpus Christi to Pascagoula, Mississippi, accounts for about half of total US refining capacity, which stands at 18.4 million barrels per day.
The nation’s biggest refinery is the Saudi Aramco-owned Motiva Enterprises plant in Port Arthur, Texas, with throughput capacity of 730,000 barrels per day, according to the company.
Among the other major Gulf Coast facilities facing possible effects from the storm is Exxon Mobil’s XOM.N refinery in Beaumont, Texas.
Major LNG companies, including Cheniere and Venture Global, also operate key liquefaction facilities along the same coastal stretch.
Exxon Mobil, Motiva Enterprises, Cheniere and Venture Global did not immediately respond to requests for comment on their storm preparations.
Forecasters said Arthur is expected to bring rainfall totals of 12cm to 25cm.
Some isolated areas could see nearly 50cm by early Friday, from the Mid and Upper Texas coast east-northeastward into southern and central Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama, as well as western parts of Georgia and the Florida Panhandle, the Miami-based NHC said.
“Very heavy rainfall is expected to fall across southeast Louisiana into southern Mississippi, where there can be significant and even life-threatening flooding, before spreading northeastward through the Carolinas and Georgia,” AccuWeather hurricane expert Alex DaSilva said.
AccuWeather said significant rain is likely to continue through Friday across the Southeast, with the greatest risk shifting from far eastern Texas and Louisiana toward Georgia by Friday.
