An area of disturbed weather with a 40 percent chance of becoming a tropical cyclone may bring heavy rain and mudslides to Haiti and Jamaica this week, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

The system, about 130 miles (209 kilometers) south of Grand Cayman, is expected to run into unfavorable conditions for additional development in about 24 hours, according to the center in Miami.

"As it goes further north it will encounter a more hostile environment," said Jim Rouiller, a senior energy meteorologist at Planalytics Inc. in Berwyn, Pennsylvania. "The whole northern Gulf of Mexico is drier and has a lot of wind shear and those will be the main things that will keep it sheltered from any real threat."

Atlantic hurricanes are a threat to Florida orange growers, who produce the second-largest crop behind Brazil, and Gulf of Mexico oil and gas platforms and refineries. The Gulf accounts for 31 percent of U.S. oil output and 43 percent of refining capacity.

Rouiller said the weather system is less a threat and more a reminder that the Atlantic season is getting under way. While it probably won't develop into a tropical cyclone, it may bring heavy rain to Jamaica, Haiti and Florida, he said.

"It is time to be vigilant now," Rouiller said by telephone.

In the eastern Pacific, a system about 425 miles south of Acapulco has a 90 percent chance of becoming that region's first tropical cyclone, according to the U.S. hurricane center. The storm, if it forms, will be called Adrian.

The storm's most probable track will be into the Pacific and away from land, Rouiller said.