On July 4, a disturbance that had brought heavy downpours to Louisiana dipped southward into the Gulf of Mexico. Though a surface low formed over water, it was weak and moved northeast back over land without any tropical development. Over the next few days, it moved inland across Georgia and South Carolina. By July 8, the broad circulation began to feel the approaching Atlantic waters and generated large areas of thunderstorm activity offshore. By that evening, the system had moved over the ocean just off the border of the Carolinas, but it lacked organization.
The morning of July 9 saw the formation of a surface vortex, but convection still lay off to the northeast of the center, precluding tropical cyclone development. It wasn't until a new center of circulation took over under the thunderstorms near Cape Hatteras that afternoon that the system became organized enough to be classified. Aircraft data indicated the presence of tropical storm force winds east of the center, so the disturbance was designated Tropical Storm Fay. Upon formation, Fay continued the streak of broken records by becoming the earliest "F" storm recorded. The previous record was Tropical Storm Franklin of 2005, which formed on July 21.
While over the northern edge of the Gulf Stream, Fay managed to develop deeper convection that night, resulting in some modest strengthening. Soon, however, the center moved over colder waters and dry air invaded the circulation, displacing thunderstorm activity away from the center to the north or southeast. Fay reached a peak intensity of 60 mph winds and a pressure of 998 mb during the morning of July 10 as it approached the mid-Atlantic coastline. Well before landfall, heavy rains spread across the northeast. That afternoon, the cyclone's center crossed the coast in southern New Jersey. Once inland, Fay decayed rapidly and lost tropical characteristics by early on July 11 over New England. Later that day, the vortex was absorbed by another system approaching from the west.
The above image shows Fay a few hours before landfall in New Jersey. The cyclone had taken on a "hybrid" appearance between tropical and subtropical, with comparatively little cloud cover near the center of circulation.
Fay took a rather unusual track up the east coast: rather then veering east, it moved nearly due northward during its time as a tropical cyclone.
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