Hurricane Irma moved toward the northern Leeward Islands on Sunday and Hurricane Watches were issued for a number of those islands.\u00a0 At 11:00 p.m. EDT on Sunday the center of Hurricane Irma was located at latitude 17.2\u00b0N and longitude 51.0\u00b0W which put it about 710 miles (1145 km) east of the Leeward Islands.\u00a0 Irma was moving toward the west-southwest at 14 m.p.h. (22 km\/h).\u00a0 The maximum sustained wind speed was 115 m.p.h. (185 km\/h) and there were wind gusts to 140 m.p.h. (225 km\/h).\u00a0 The minimum surface pressure was 961 mb.<\/p>\n
Hurricane Watches were in effect for Antigua, Barbuda, Anguilla, Montserrat, St. Kitts, Nevis, Saba, St. Eustatius, St. Maarten, St, Martin, and St. Barthelemy.<\/p>\n
The circulation of Hurricane Irma is very well organized.\u00a0 There is a nearly circular eye with a diameter of 30 miles (48 km) at the center of circulation.\u00a0 The eye is surrounded by a ring of strong thunderstorms and the strongest winds are occurring in the northeastern part of the ring.\u00a0 Bands of showers and thunderstorms are revolving around the core of Hurricane Irma.\u00a0 Thunderstorms around the core are generating strong upper level divergence which is pumping mass away in all directions from the hurricane.\u00a0 Winds to hurricane force extend out about 35 miles (55 km) from the center.\u00a0 Winds to tropical storm force extend out about 140 miles (225 km) from the center.<\/p>\n
The Hurricane Intensity Index (HII) for Hurricane Irma is 20.6.\u00a0 The Hurricane Size Index (HSI) is 11.7 and the Hurricane Wind Intensity Size Index (HWISI) is 32.3.<\/p>\n
Hurricane Irma will move through an environment favorable for intensification.\u00a0 Irma will move over water where the Sea Surface Temperature is near 29\u00b0C and there is warmer water farther west.\u00a0 The upper level winds are weak and there is little vertical wind shear.\u00a0 Hurricane Irma could intensify into a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Scale.\u00a0 There is a possibility that Irma could strengthen to Category 5 when it passes near the northern Leeward Islands and moves toward the Bahamas.\u00a0 Hurricane Irma has already completed several eyewall replacement cycles and there could be more.\u00a0 Each eyewall replacement cycle could result in fluctuations in the intensity of Hurricane Irma.<\/p>\n
A strong subtropical high pressure system over the Atlantic Ocean is steering Hurricane Irma toward the west-southwest.\u00a0 The high is forecast to weaken just a bit during the next several days and Hurricane Irma is expected to move more toward the west-northwest.\u00a0 On its anticipated track Hurricane Irma will approach the northward Leeward Islands on Tuesday night.\u00a0 It will be a strong, dangerous hurricane at that time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hurricane Irma moved toward the northern Leeward Islands on Sunday and Hurricane Watches were issued for a number of those islands.\u00a0 At 11:00 p.m. EDT on Sunday the center of Hurricane Irma was located at latitude 17.2\u00b0N and longitude 51.0\u00b0W which put it about 710 miles (1145 km) east of the Leeward Islands.\u00a0 Irma was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,2],"tags":[208,205,144,51,98,801,650,140,100,22,99,97,30,804],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4704"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4704"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4704\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4705,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4704\/revisions\/4705"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4704"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4704"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jayhobgood.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4704"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}