Near the end of June, a tropical disturbance developed over the Bahamas and moved slowly northwestward. It wasn't very organized, but brought rain to the islands and to portions of the U.S. southeast coast by July 1. That day, a low-level circulation center did appear on satellite, located almost exactly on the coastline of Georgia. The atmospheric steering currents weren't particularly strong in the area and the low began to move northeast parallel to the coast as it rounded a high pressure area over the western Atlantic. Unexpectedly, the system maintained enough convection to be classified a tropical cyclone early on July 2. Since satellite data indicated that there were gale force winds off of the South Carolina coast, the system was named Tropical Storm Colin. When named, the center was actually a little bit inland over South Carolina!
Despite forming against the odds, Colin had a little too much to contend with: wind shear out of the west was ripping convection away from the center and the interaction with land further disrupted the cyclone. It steadily lost organization as it moved over North Carolina and ultimately dissipated early on July 3.
The above image shows Colin right after formation as a tropical storm.
Unusually, Colin spent all of its short time as a tropical cyclone (circle points) over land.
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