Tropical Storm Beryl is forecast to become the first hurricane of the season before skirting the southern tip of Barbados in the south-eastern Caribbean on Sunday.
Beryl currently holds maximum sustained winds of 60mph (95km/h) and is traveling west at 21mph (34km/h), according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center.
Forecasters at the hurricane center expect the storm to strengthen into a hurricane by the time it reaches the island, bringing heavy rain and winds, as well as dangerous storm surge. Barbados has already issued a hurricane watch. Beryl’s center is forecast to pass 26 miles (42km) south of the island.
Current storm models show Beryl then passing south of the Dominican Republic and Haiti, over Jamaica and the Cayman Islands, and toward Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula.
Meteorologists say the formation of the storm is being helped by below-normal wind shear that reduces early summer winds considered disruptive to hurricane development, according to the Weather Channel.
“We need to be ready,” the prime minister of Barbados, Mia Mottley, said in a public address late on Friday. “You and I know when these things happen, it is better to plan for the worst and pray for the best.”
Mottley noted that thousands of people are in Barbados for the Twenty20 World Cup cricket final, with India and South Africa playing in Bridgetown on Saturday.
The home affairs minister, Wilfred Abrahams, said Barbadians know what they have to do when a hurricane approaches the island, including removing fishing vessels from the water, cleaning drains and waterways, and flushing Bridgetown and other areas.
“All of the regular preparation that we do for hurricanes is in full swing for us,” the minister said, reported Barbados Today.
Beryl is the first named Atlantic storm but the second named storm of the season, which runs from 1 June to 30 November in the Atlantic. Last week, Tropical Storm Alberto out of the Gulf of Mexico delivered flooding to parts of Texas and north-eastern Mexico.
Beryl is considered unusual, according to reports, because it formed early in the season and in the tropical Atlantic east of Caribbean. According to the National Hurricane Center, the first storms of hurricane season usually form in early to mid-August.
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In a report released last month, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicted an “above average” hurricane season with 17 to 25 storms, eight to 13 hurricanes, and four to seven major hurricanes of category 3 or higher.
The US agency attributes the increase to El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) that causes storm formations to oscillate between the Pacific and Atlantic oceans, strengthening hurricane activity in one region while weakening it in the other.
But with La Niña likely developing this summer, the number of hurricanes and tropical/subtropical storms is likely to increase. La Niña favors increased Atlantic hurricane activity in part by decreasing atmospheric stability.
“That means that it is easier for warm, moist air at the Atlantic surface to rise high in the atmosphere, forming the clouds and rainfall that allow tropical storms to develop and intensify,” the agency says.