Hurricane Lee exploded into a powerful Category 5 storm within 24 hours as it whirled across the open Atlanta Ocean but has downgraded to a Category 3, though forecasted predict could gain strength over the weekend and into next week.
“Confidence in the intensity forecast is low at the moment, although it is likely that Lee will remain a dangerous hurricane for at least the next [five] days,” according to the National Hurricane Center.
It remains “too soon to know” what its potential impacts “if any” along the US Atlantic seaboard could look like, though “dangerous surf and rip currents are expected” on Sunday and Monday and could “worsen” in the coming week, the center announced.
Lee was roughly 400 miles east-northeast of the northern Leeward Islands as of Saturday, with maximum sustained winds of 115 mph.
The storm is expected to pass north of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the northern Leeward Islands, according to forecasters, but life-threatening surf and rip conditions generated by the hurricane could impact the British and US Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the Bahamas and Bermuda.
