Hurricane Lee continues its journey toward the eastern coast of the U.S. on Monday, bringing major hazards to the region in an unexpected turn of events.
While it remains too soon to tell the exact level of threat to the east coast and Atlantic Canada, the weather system brought dangerous surf and life-threatening rip currents to the northern Leeward Islands, Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, Turks and Caicos’, the Bahamas, and Bermuda in mid-September, according to the National Hurricane Center.
5pm AST Sun Sep 10th Key Messages for #Hurricane #Lee.
Hazardous beach conditions to spread across the western Atlantic this week. Too soon to know level of impacts for US East coast or Atlantic Canada late this week, so stay tuned for updates. https://t.co/w5INoaj9KX pic.twitter.com/NaXXHp21Mz
— National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) September 10, 2023
Radar models shared online suggest Lee will continue tracking northwards through to September 16, when it’ll hit Cape Cod and Nova Scotia. At least three major systems are currently active within the Atlantic, so another may blast up and through the East Coast within a matter of days. However, NHC is hoping Lee will downgrade from a Cat. 5 storm to a lower-level threat within this time. (RELATED: Entire East Coast Of US Needs To ‘Watch’ As Hurricane Lee’s Forecast Updates)
Lee started as a tropical depression off the coast of Africa in early September and strengthened to a hurricane in less than 24 hours. It was unclear for a while whether Lee reached Cat. 4 or Cat. 5 strength. It was then downgraded to a Cat. 3 storm before it started regaining strength on Monday morning, according to WESH meteorologist Eric Burris.