A deep plume of tropical moisture streaming ahead of Hurricane Helene ran into a boundary parked over the interior southeastern United States. This boundary squeezed the tropical moisture out of the air like a sponge, leading to days of heavy rain across the mountainous terrain of North Carolina and Tennessee.

Follow Saturday's updates on Sara's forecast and flooding The National Hurricane Center said Friday afternoon that Tropical Storm Sara is meandering near the northern coast of Honduras and that heavy rainfall from the storm is likely to cause "life-threatening" flash flooding and mudslides into early next week for portions of Central America.

Tropical Storm Sara, a disorganized mass of rain and thunderstorms, was slowly meandering along the northern coast of Honduras on Friday morning, after making landfall near the Honduras-Nicaragua border late Thursday.