Tropical Storm Cristobal was the third tropical storm of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season. It began on July 19 as a weather system away from the Southeast U.S. Coast. It became a tropical storm later that day. Cristobal stayed away from land, and reached its highest strength as a strong tropical storm on July 21. It moved to the northeast next to the U.S. East Coast and died out on July 23 near Nova Scotia. Because it was a weak storm and never moved onto land, Cristobal's damages were mostly moderate rainfall. The storm dropped 3.43 in (87 mm) of rain in Wilmington, North Carolina, where minor flooding happened. Also, the remnants helped produce rainfall on Nova Scotia, which caused some flooding on roads and in basements.