Isabel grows into Category 4 hurricane
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Satellite image of Hurricane Isabel taken Monday at 8:45 a.m. EDT
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| HURRICANE ISABEL |
At 11 p.m. EDT Monday Latitude: 18.5 north Longitude: 44.5 west Position: 1,135 miles (1,825 kilometers) east of the northern Leeward Islands Top sustained winds: Near 135 mph (215 km/h) Map: Projected path |
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(CNN) -- Hurricane Isabel, churning in the Atlantic far east of the Caribbean, grew Monday into a strong Category 4 storm, forecasters said.
Top sustained winds were near 135 mph, with additional strengthening possible, the National Hurricane Center in Miami said.
At 11 p.m. EDT, the center of Hurricane Isabel was about 1,135 miles (1,825 kilometers) east of the northern Leeward Islands, moving toward the west-northwest near 13 mph (20 km/h).
The NHC said the storm would likely approach the Caribbean on a path similar to the one followed by Hurricane Fabian, which slammed Bermuda late last week. But the forecasts for Isabel do not include the northeasterly turn that sent Fabian toward the British territory.
Isabel is the fourth hurricane of the 2003 Atlantic season and the second major storm, coming on the heals of Hurricane Fabian, which slammed into Bermuda on Friday.
Isabel is following a similar course across the Atlantic to that followed by Fabian, although National Hurricane Center forecasters have not yet seen evidence that Isabel will make the northeasterly turn that brought Fabian to Bermuda.
Instead, forecasters said the storm could dip south of due west and threaten the northern Caribbean islands.
Meanwhile, the hurricane center said it was discontinuing public advisories about Fabian, which was quickly becoming extratropical in the north Atlantic, although it still had hurricane strength winds at 75 mph.
But at the same time, the center announced the formation of Tropical Depression 14 in the eastern Atlantic, about 260 miles (420 km) south of the southernmost Cape Verde Islands. The storm was creeping westward at 5 mph, and forecasters said a gradual turn to the northwest was expected over the next 24 hours.
With top winds at 30 mph (45 km/h), the forecasters said it could become a tropical storm -- Juan -- later Monday or Tuesday, and reach hurricane strength by the end of the week. A tropical depression becomes a tropical storm when its top wind speeds reach 39 mph and a hurricane at 74 mph.
