Hurricane season doesn't officially start until June 1, but there could be something brewing in the Gulf already.

The National Hurricane Center on Sunday said there's a chance -- a medium chance -- a subtropical or tropical system could develop in the southeastern Gulf in the next few days.

Where could it go? Early indications are it could head toward the northern Gulf Coast by Wednesday night.

On Sunday the large area of disturbed weather stretched from western Cuba across the southeastern Gulf into the Florida Peninsula.

The hurricane center said the system is expected to move slowly northward over the next few days, and it could acquire the features of a tropical or subtropical storm as it does.

The chances of a depression forming over the next five days were 40 percent, according to the hurricane center.

Development or not, the system will bring rain to Florida and the northeastern Gulf over the next few days.

What should Alabama expect if it does head this way?

The first thing will be rough surf along the beaches and an increase in the rip current risk, according to John Purdy, a lead forecaster at the National Weather Service in Mobile.

"The second impact, depending on how much the low strengthens over time, would be some minor coastal flooding potential due to the higher swells working their way onshore," he said Sunday evening.

However, it's still a developing system and confidence in its intensity and track are very low confidence at this point, Purdy said.

"It's very hard to tell how strong it will be, but looking at the track and looking at the models it's likely that we will be on the western edge of the surface low," he said.

"But of course these things could change in time especially since it hasn't really developed yet. So the models are just kind of trying to get a grasp of where the center of circulation is going to form, and then once that happens and the data is injected into the models we'll have a better idea about where it could come ashore."

If the system impacts north Florida it could bring a lot of rain over the peninsula but also to southeast Alabama, Purdy said.

"There's the potential or some heavy rains, so we'll have to monitor the potential for some flash flooding depending on the speed of the system and how far west it goes," he said.

A storm has to have a closed center of circulation and winds of at least 39 mph to be considered a tropical storm and get a name.

The first name on the 2018 Atlantic storm list is Alberto.

Purdy said that this system should serve as a good reminder that it's time to get your storm preparations in order so that you're prepared no matter what happens.

The Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 until Nov. 30.