The peak of hurricane season arrives Saturday — and the Atlantic is bustling with activity.
The National Hurricane Center on Friday is watching slightly stronger Hurricane Earl as it moves away from Bermuda, which is still under a tropical warning.
Earl’s swells are likely to cause life-threatening surf and rip current conditions in Bermuda and portions of the U.S. East Coast, as well as Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, through the weekend, the hurricane center said. The system is forecast to turn into a powerful post-tropical cyclone on Saturday.
Forecasters are also watching a new disturbance that is forecast to move off the coast of Africa by early next week. There are two other disturbances in the Atlantic, one of which whose window to form into a “short-lived tropical cyclone” is closing.
None are a threat to Florida.
Here’s your forecast:
Hurricane Earl
Hurricane Earl was about 190 miles east-northeast of Bermuda Friday morning. The Category 2 storm is rushing quickly northeast at 18 mph and is forecast to go a little faster later Friday before slowing considerably over the weekend in the Atlantic.
Earl is forecast to drop one to three inches of rain across Bermuda Friday.
Data from NOAA hurricane hunters shows that Earl’s maximum sustained winds increased early Friday to near 100 mph with higher gusts. Its wind field also grew overnight, with hurricane-force winds extending up to 80 miles from the center, and tropical-storm-force winds extending up to 205 miles.
The National Hurricane Center expects the system will grow slightly stronger by early Saturday, with maximum sustained winds of 110 mph, making it just shy of Category 3-level strength. To be a Cat 3, the hurricane needs maximum sustained winds of at least 111 mph. It’s also no longer forecast to be a Cat 4 hurricane, which would need maximum sustained winds of at least 130 mph.
“Earl is expected to complete its transition to a powerful hurricane-force extratropical low on Saturday and then gradually weaken through early Monday,” the hurricane center said.
The National Hurricane Center also notes that a “a few models ... still bring Earl to major hurricane strength in 24 hours, but given that the cyclone will be starting to undergo extratropical transition by then, that scenario is becoming increasingly unlikely (although not impossible).”
Three disturbances
The disturbance forecasters thought could potentially turn into the Atlantic’s next tropical storm is continuing to get battered by strong upper-level winds, reducing its chances of formation Friday morning.
The system, about 1100 miles east of the Leeward Islands, has a well-defined center of circulation but the strong upper-level winds “have caused most of the disorganized shower and thunderstorm activity associated with the low to be displaced well to its northeast,” the hurricane center said in its Friday morning advisory. “The strong upper-level winds are forecast to persist for the next several days and it is becoming less likely that a short-lived tropical storm will form.”
Forecasters reduced its formation chances from 40% to 30% through the next two to five days as it moves quickly west-northwest over the central Atlantic. If it were to strengthen into a tropical storm, it would be named Fiona.
The other two disturbances forecasters are watching — one that is several hundred miles south of the Cabo Verde Islands and another that is in the coast of Africa — have no chance of formation within the next 48 hours and a low 20% chance of formation through the next five days.
The hurricane center notes that any potential development of the system south of the Cabo Verde Islands would be “slow to occur” as it quickly moves west or west-northwest. It says the disturbance in the African coast could see some gradual development once it moves into the Atlantic and starts heading west.
When is the peak of hurricane season?
Saturday is the “climatological peak” of the Atlantic hurricane season and is when “conditions are most optimal for tropical storms and hurricanes over the largest area,” according to the Weather Channel. The next
