Hurricane Rafael Weakening and Turning Away from the U.S.

After days of speculation about a potential Gulf Coast landfall, Hurricane Rafael is going to spare the U.S. Here is the latest on this late season tropical feature.

Latest Details on Hurricane Rafael

The latest forecast models out of the National Hurricane Center (NHC) show that Hurricane Rafael is moving away from the U.S. as it began to track to the west rather than to the north. The feature is also expected to gradually lose wind intensity this weekend as it moves closer to Mexico.

As of Friday, Rafael was a Category 2 storm with maximum sustained winds of 110 mph. The storm was moving to the west at a speed of 9 mph. Rafael is distinguished as the first hurricane of at least a Category 3 or higher to roam the Gulf of Mexico since Kate did so in 1985. Rafael is also the first hurricane that made it into the Gulf of Mexico that will not make a direct strike on the U.S. this year.

Earlier in the week, forecasters had been worried that the non-tropical storm that is currently churning over the south-central U.S. would work to scoop up Rafael and bring its moisture up to the north and into the central portion of the Gulf Coast. While there is still likely to be a short period of time this weekend when the non-tropical storm is able to latch onto Rafael and pull up its moisture, it will not be powerful enough to bring the feature to the coast. Instead, the brief scoop will mean that Rafael will simply stall out a bit before moving into Mexico.

At this point, Rafael is also expected to encounter an area of increasing wind shear. This disruptive shear will cause Rafael to weaken further. Forecasters believe that Rafael will have devolved into a tropical storm by the time that it moves into the Bay of Campeche, also sparing Mexico the worst of its impacts.

The northeastern region of Mexico will be at the highest risk of seeing heavy rain next week, creating the threat of flash flooding. However, there is also the possibility that the wind shear will be strong enough to break up Rafael before it moves ashore.