Three Pacific hurricanes: Marie will miss California but Lowell may head for Hawaii
Major hurricane Lowell is now forecast to make a sharp right turn to the north this weekend, putting it on course to potentially bring significant impacts to Hawaii
The tropical Pacific is bustling with activity this week with now three hurricanes spread out across the basin. While one storm has garnered a lot of attention in California over the past couple of days, another could be a much more serious threat to land soon.
Hurricane Marie
Marie strengthened into a Category 1 hurricane Wednesday evening. The latest forecast has the storm maintaining strength over the next few days as it drifts north. It will weaken into a tropical storm over open water, hundreds of miles from California.
Hearst Owned
Hurricane Marie will slowly strengthen over the next couple of days but it will stay over open water.
Winds high in the atmosphere may still tap into some of Marie’s tropical moisture and bring beneficial rain showers to Southern California, southern Nevada and the western Four Corners this weekend. Flooding is not currently expected for SoCal.
Hurricane Karina
Hurricane Karina has been the most impressive-looking on satellite images. As of Wednesday evening, the Category 4 storm has peak winds of 130 mph.
Hearst Owned
Karina is a powerful category four hurricane but it will not be a threat to land.
Karina will weaken quickly this weekend as it tracks north of Hawaii.
Hurricane Lowell
Hurricane Lowell intensified very quickly over the past couple of days in the Central Pacific.
On Tuesday, it was a tropical storm with maximum winds of 70 mph. By Thursday afternoon, the storm was an intense Category 5 hurricane with peak winds of 160 mph.
Lowell is centered hundreds of miles to the south of Hilo, Hawaii, but the National Hurricane Center’s forecast shows the storm making a sharp right turn to the north this weekend.
Hearst Owned
Lowell is forecast to make a sharp right turn towards Hawaii this weekend. Whether or not this storm will directly affect the islands or make landfall is uncertain at this point, but residents and visitors need to pay close attention to this forecast over the next few days.
This means Lowell could be headed towards Hawaii early next week as a major hurricane, but NHC forecasters say that the long-range forecast is “unusually uncertain” at this point. In a public advisory statement, experts encouraged people in Hawaii to watch the forecast closely and make sure that their hurricane plans and supply kits are ready to go.
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