Sept. 4 (Bloomberg) -- A tropical depression far out in the Atlantic ocean will become Tropical Storm Florence later today, the sixth named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

It's too early to attempt to predict whether Florence will enter the Gulf of Mexico or make any landfall, said senior forecaster Richard Pasch at the National Hurricane Center.

"It's just too far out and I wouldn't want to make a statement one way or the other,'' he said in a telephone interview. "This is just a typical location for the formation of an Atlantic hurricane.''

Hurricanes in the basin are carefully watched because they can wreak property destruction, damage oil and gas rigs and play havoc with marine and air transportation. Last September's Hurricane Katrina caused about $81 billion in damage and killed more than 1,800 people.