Hurricane Earl to hit Bermuda with 72mph winds as storm swell threatens US East Coast

The US east coast should expect hazardous rip currents

Hurricane Earl is set to graze Bermuda on Thursday afternoon bringing ferocious winds and heavy rains to the Atlantic island.

Tropical storm force winds of up to 72 miles per hour (116 kilometres per hour) are expected, along with one to three inches of rain.

The government of Bermuda has encouraged residents to secure outdoor furniture, make any needed repairs to their homes and stock up on medical prescriptions in preparation of the storm.

Storm swells from the hurricane will ripple across the Atlantic and bring dangerous coastal conditions to the eastern United States by Thursday night.

Earl strengthened to a Category -hurricane on Wednesday, with maximum wind speeds up to 105mph (165 kph). By late Thursday, the storm is forecast to increase to Category , making it the first major hurricane of the year in the Atlantic.

The storm is not forecast to directly hit Bermuda but the island is expected to see tropical storm conditions as the hurricane passes to the southeast. Bermuda has about a 10 per cent chance of receiving hurricane-force winds, according to the National Hurricane Centre (NHC).

The Bermuda Weather Service has placed the island under a tropical storm warning, and a hurricane watch.

After passing Bermuda, Earl is forecast to reach Category-4 status late on Friday with maximum wind speeds up to 132 mph (212 kph).

The US east coast should expect hazardous rip currents and some minor coastal flooding as the hurricane’s wake reaches land.

The National Weather Service office along the Carolina coast has warned that “everyone should stay out of the water” to avoid rip currents, when near-shore waters create strong pulls out into the ocean.

Rip currents can lead people very far from shore, and result in drownings. Anyone caught in a rip current should swim parallel to the beach to try and escape the pull out to sea before attempting to swim back to land.

Earl is just the second hurricane of the year in the Atlantic, and only the fifth named storm.

Despite forecasts of an “above-normal” hurricane season, the Atlantic has so far been extremely quiet, even through August, usually one of the peak hurricane months. This was the first year since 1997 that no named storms formed in the ocean through the entirety of August.

But storm activity is starting to ramp up. Hurricanes Earl and Danielle have formed in the past two weeks, and NHC is watching two other systems with the potential to form cyclones in the next few days.

One of those storm systems, which on Thursday was halfway between the Caribbean and West Africa, had a 70 per cent chance of forming a cyclone in the next two days. If it were to reach maximum winds of at least 39 mph (63 kph), it would be named Tropical Storm Fiona.

NHC forecast up to 20 named storms this year, with up to 10 hurricanes — including three to five “major hurricanes” of Category 3 or higher.

Climate scientists say that as the planet gets warmer, hurricanes are likely to get a long stronger on average. Warmer air and oceans can power up winds and pump a lot more water into storm clouds, creating even more damaging effects when those hurricanes hit landfall.

A United Nations climate science panel says that the proportion of hurricanes reaching Category 3 or higher has been increasing over the past 40 years.