Hurricane Sam’s winds drop to 120 mph; tropical depressions likely to form this week
Hurricane Sam weakened to a Category 3 hurricane on Monday, with top winds of 120 mph, but it’s expected to remain a major hurricane for at least the next five days, according to the National Hurricane Center.
If Sam holds to its major hurricane status for that period, meaning Category 3 or above, Sam will be the longest-lived major hurricane to form on or after Sept. 23 since Hurricane Matthew in 2016, according to Colorado State University hurricane expert Phil Klotzbach.
While Hurricane Sam’s intensity is forecast to slowly decline this week as it encounters storm-shredding wind shear, forecasters expect Sam will strengthen again.
Sam is expected to maintain its movement to the northwest through midweek, then head north, turning it away from Florida and the Caribbean, but bringing it closer to
Bermuda.
“The sooner Sam begins to track to the north, the more likely the hurricane’s dangerous eyewall, with its destructive winds, will avoid the [far eastern Caribbean] islands,” according to AccuWeather.
As of 5 p.m. Monday, Sam was about 700 miles east of the islands of the northeastern Caribbean, moving northwest at 9 mph. Sam’s hurricane-force winds extend 30 miles from its center.
Sam, the fourth major hurricane of 2021, is expected to pick up speed on Thursday.
Sam was the fifth storm this season — along with Elsa, Grace, Ida and Larry — to undergo rapid intensification, meaning that its top winds increased by 35 mph or more within 24 hours. On Saturday it swiftly intensified from a Category 2 hurricane to a Category 4.
In addition to Sam, experts are monitoring several other areas in the tropics for potential development.
Forecasters said Monday that two tropical depressions could form by midweek in the far eastern Atlantic, one from a tropical wave rolling off Africa’s west coast Monday and the other from an area of low pressure just to its west. Each has been given a 90% chance of developing within the next five days.
There’s also a medium chance that the remnants of Tropical Storm Peter could form into a tropical depression in the next 48 hours or so southeast of Bermuda, according to experts.
The 2021 hurricane season continues to outpace previous seasons.
We’ve had 19 named storms so far this season, which is well above the long-term average of 10.5 named storms by Sept. 26 in previous years, for the period 1999 through 2020, according to Klotzbach.
The remaining storm names for the 2021 season, which runs through Nov. 30, are Victor and Wanda.
If we run out of names, experts will turn to an overflow list this year, which includes Adria, Braylen, Caridad, Deshawn, Emery, Foster, Gemma and Heath.