Hurricane Earl Weakens as It Heads Toward Newfoundland

Hurricane Earl was downgraded to a post-tropical cyclone Saturday but was expected to bring strong winds over Newfoundland through Sunday, along with large swells along the U.S. East Coast.

The storm pushed north into the Atlantic late Friday, after its outer bands swept past Bermuda with tropical-storm-force winds and heavy rain, but heavy winds from the system were expected to affect Newfoundland through the weekend, the National Hurricane Center said.

Earl was upgraded from a tropical storm Tuesday night, becoming the second hurricane of the 2022 Atlantic season. Forecasters predict that it will move slowly northeast “to the southeast of Newfoundland” Saturday night through Monday, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Swells from the storm are expected to cause life-threatening surf and rip currents along the U.S. East Coast and Nova Scotia and Newfoundland in Canada through the weekend.

No coastal watches or warnings were in effect as of Saturday evening, in the hurricane center’s last notice about the storm.

As of 5 p.m. Eastern time Saturday, the storm was about 215 miles south of Cape Race, Newfoundland, and moving north-northeast at 10 mph, with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph, the hurricane center said. Hurricane-force winds extended outward up to 90 miles from the center, and tropical-storm-force winds extended outward up to 485 miles.

The Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June to November, has had a relatively quiet start, with only three named storms before last week. There were no named storms in the Atlantic during August, the first time that has happened since 1997.

In addition to Earl, Hurricane Danielle, which was downgraded to a post-tropical storm Thursday, has been meandering across the central North Atlantic. Meteorologists were also monitoring an area of low pressure almost 1,000 miles west of the Cabo Verde Islands, off the west coast of Africa, that they said was likely to develop into a tropical depression over the next day or so.

In the Pacific, Hurricane Kay brought heavy rain across the Baja California peninsula and Southern California on Friday. In early August, scientists at NOAA issued an updated forecast for the rest of the season, which still predicted an above-normal level of activity. In it, they said that the season — which runs through Nov. 30 — could see 14 to 20 named storms, with six to 10 turning into hurricanes with sustained winds of at least 74 mph. Three to five of those could strengthen into what NOAA calls major hurricanes — Category 3 or stronger — with winds of at least 111 mph.

Last year, there were 21 named storms, after a record-breaking 30 in 2020. For the past two years, meteorologists have exhausted the list of names used to identify storms during the Atlantic hurricane season, an occurrence that has happened only one other time, in 2005.

The links between hurricanes and climate change have become clearer with each passing year. Data shows that hurricanes have become stronger worldwide during the past four decades. Over time, a warming planet can expect stronger hurricanes and a higher incidence of the most powerful storms — though the overall number of storms could drop, because factors like stronger wind shear could keep weaker storms from forming.