The first major hurricane of the 2024 Atlantic Hurricane season, which begins on June 1 and runs until November 30, is named Hurricane Beryl and it has been currently upgraded to a category three storm from category two.
Tropical Storm Beryl was officially declared a Hurricane on Saturday afternoon, it was formed late on Friday and strengthened later, that the forecasters had to warn and all the regions went into precaution mode.
It intensified on the night of Saturday and on early Sunday morning the sustained winds started reaching to 90 miles per hour, the forecasters informed.
On Sunday morning, the National Hurricane Center shared that, it is expected to bring “life-threatening winds and storm surge” to the Windward Islands, north of Venezuela and southeast of Puerto Rico as it continues moving west.
Immediately, a warning related to the hurricane was issued for several islands including Barbados, Grenada, Saint Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.
However, the islands of Tobago and Martinique received a tropical storm warning, while Dominica was kept under a tropical storm watch.
The US National Hurricane Centre (NHC) has forecasted that Beryl is expected to rapidly strengthen and become extremely dangerous and will upgrade to category four. The intensifying will happen before Beryl will reach the Windward islands.
The potential impacts of Hurricane Beryl include, while it will move towards the Windward Islands, on early Monday devastating wind damage can be expected.
The surge in water levels, from six to nine feet, ranges above the normal tide levels.
Rainfall of 75 to 150 millimetres throughout Barbados and also the Windward Islands on Sunday night into Monday are expected and it may cause flooding as well at several areas that are vulnerable.
Swells caused by Beryl might reach the Windward and southern Leeward Islands by the evening of Sunday.
