Hurricane Chris is weaker; remnants of Beryl soak Bahamas

Hurricane Chris’ most powerful winds have dropped from 100 mph to 90 mph, downgrading the hurricane from a Category 2 to a Category 1 storm.

Chris was over 900 miles east -northeast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, and moving northeast at a decent pace of 25 miles per hour.

The National Hurricane Center said in a 5 p.m. Wednesday update that Chris was “skedaddling northeastward over the open Atlantic.”

Chris was expected to approach southeastern Newfoundland on Thursday night as a post-tropical storm, bringing 1 to 3 inches of rain, with the potential for up to 6 inches in isolated areas, to Newfoundland.

Meanwhile, Beryl’s remnants were still a disorganized smattering of clouds and rainshowers moving north over the Bahamas.

Hurricane forecasters were still saying Wednesday evening there was a 50 percent chance of Beryl reorganizing and becoming a tropical depression, tropical storm, or hurricane.

An Air Force Reserve reconnaissance aircraft was scheduled to check out Beryl’s remnants on Wednesday, but that flight was canceled.

Forecasters at the Miami-South Florida branch of the National Weather Service said that despite Beryl’s expected foray into the Bahamas, that it was not looking like it would affect South Florida.

Beryl had been the first hurricane of the 2018 Atlantic hurricane season. It dissipated and was downgraded from a tropical storm Sunday, but Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands were hit by power outages and flooding Monday.