Whatever remains of Hurricane Humberto could provide Maryland with a bit of needed rain late tomorrow. Forecasters out at Sterling say how much we get will depend on timing.

UPDATE: 11:15 a.m.  After less than 10 hours as a hurricane, Humberto was downgraded this morning to a tropical storm.

As the storm moves inland into the Deep South, its moisture will be swept north and east toward the mid-Atlantic. But we're also looking at a cold front that's expected to move across the region tomorrow. That could shove much of Humberto's remnants aside, to our south and east. In that case we'd get our rain primarily from the front itself, without the added tropical moisture.

"Less than a quarter-inch," said Sterling forecaster Calvin Meadows. "Possibly more" if Humberto's rains make it this far. But "I'm not going to hazard an amount, since I'm not sure which is going to get here first."

In either case we'll get some rain. Here's the forecast. Here's the national radar loop showing where the rain is headed now.

It's been a pretty interesting hurricane season, hasn't it? The first two storms of the season, Dean and Felix, both reach Cat. 5, the first time that's happened since they began keeping records. And both remain at Cat. 5 at landfall, also a first. And now, forecasters are surprised when the third hurricane, Humberto, accelerates from a tropical depression to an 85- mph, Cat. 1 hurricane in just a matter of hours.

"To put this development in perspective, no tropical cyclone in the historical record has ever reached this intensity at a faster rate near landfall," Hurricane Center specialist James Franklin told an online discussion group, according to CNN. "It would be nice to know, someday, why this happened."

Very warm water in the Gulf, and Humberto's lingering pace over water might be part of the answer.