Weakened Barry delivers rainfall

Tropical Storm Barry weakened into a tropical depression as it moved through Tampa Bay on Saturday, bringing nearly 7 inches of rain to parts of the parched region.

Forecasters canceled tropical storm warnings and watches for stretches of the Gulf Coast. The depression’s sustained winds had slowed to near 35 mph, and it was moving north-northeast at about 23 mph.

The storm, which formed on the first day of the Atlantic hurricane season, made landfall in the Tampa Bay area in the morning and had moved across the state to Jacksonville by the evening, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said.

Dry conditions in Florida have left Lake Okeechobee, the second-largest freshwater lake in the contiguous U.S., at its lowest recorded level, and have allowed a brush fire on the Georgia-Florida border to burn for weeks.

“This is a blessing,” said Bob Buning, an employee at MacRae’s Bait Shop in Homosassa, where boaters had returned to the Homosassa River on Saturday afternoon. “We needed this rain really bad.”

Barry had brought nearly 6 inches of rain to Melbourne and nearly 7 inches to West Palm Beach by Saturday morning. It was expected to drop 3 to 6 inches of rain on parts of Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina. Isolated areas could get as much as 10 inches.

“It’ll help a little bit, but everyone is so far below rainfall that we’re still going to be under drought conditions,” said Kim Brabander, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service. She said 30 to 40 inches of rain were needed.

The rain was expected to help cool down some of the smoldering areas of a huge wildfire along the Florida-Georgia border, allowing fire crews to focus on spots where the fire is raging, said Larry Morris of the firefighters’ joint information center.