Strengthening TS Beryl could become hurricane

Tropical storm Beryl has formed in the Atlantic Ocean, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Winds have increased to 50 mph and Beryl could become a hurricane as early as today or Saturday, according to the hurricane center, but it’s no threat to Florida.

As of 5 p.m., the storm was located 1,295 miles east-southeast of the Lesser Antilles moving west at 16 mph. The storm center said Beryl is a small storm with tropicalstorm-force winds only extending out 35 miles from the center.

A tropical storm is a cyclone with maximum sustained surface wind speed ranging between 39 miles per hour and 73 miles per hour.

The storm is located between the Cabo Verde Islands and the Lesser Antilles, southeast of the Caribbean Sea. The system is expected to move west and north, deteriorating before it approaches the Lesser Antilles, an arc of small islands in the Caribbean southeast of Puerto Rico.

But it could bring heavy rains

and winds on Sunday and Monday to portions of the Leeward Islands, which include the Virgin Islands.

The hurricane center also is watching an area of showers and thunderstorms a few hundred miles southwest of Bermuda. This system appears to be less organized, the center said, and the chances for a tropical depression to form are diminishing. It’s projected to move west and north, between Bermuda and the east coast of the United States.