Gustav Becomes a Hurricane

Written by: Brian Neudorff

In a span of 12 hours Gustav went from being named a tropical storm at 2pm EDT Monday to being a category 1 hurricane at 2am EDT Tuesday morning, and it doesn't appear Gustav is done getting stronger.

The National Hurricane Center in Miami, FL, which you will see me refer to NHC through most of my posts, upgraded Gustav to a hurricane early Tuesday morning. Gustav had winds sustained at 80 mph, which makes it a category 1 on the Saffir-Simpson scale. It continue to strengthen 3 hours later. As of the 5am EDT update from the NHC Gustav winds had increased to 85 mph. It appears Gustav could be a major hurricane, category 3 or stronger, in the coming days per the NHC 5am discussion on Gustav:

SATELLITE IMAGES SHOW AN ORGANIZING PATTERN WITH A CENTRAL DENSE OVERCAST BECOMING MORE PROMINENT AND GUSTAV IS LIKELY NOT DONE INTENSIFYING BEFORE IT PASSES OVER SOUTHWESTERN HAITI LATER TODAY. SOME WEAKENING IS SHOWN IN 24 HR DUE TO THE LAND INTERACTION WITH HAITI. THEREAFTER...THE HURRICANE IS FORECAST TO BE OVER EXTREMELY WARM WATERS WITH RELATIVELY LIGHT SHEAR. THE OFFICIAL INTENSITY FORECAST IS INCREASED AND NOW CALLS FOR GUSTAV TO BE A MAJOR HURRICANE IN THE NORTHWESTERN CARIBBEAN SEA. IT IS WORTH NOTING THAT BOTH THE GFDL/HWRF FORECAST SHOW AN EVEN STRONGER HURRICANE. MOST INDICATIONS ARE THAT GUSTAV WILL BE AN EXTREMELY DANGEROUS HURRICANE IN THE NORTHWESTERN CARIBBEAN SEA IN A FEW DAYS.

Hurricane warnings have been issued for the southern and western coasts of Haiti and should make landfall later today.