Hurricane Maria: Path forecast keeps Maria away from U.S. mainland

Hurricane Maria was moving away from the Bahamas on Friday night on a path that should keep it away from land.

Those along the East Coast of the U.S. are warily watching the Category 3 hurricane, but forecasters believe it will spare the mainland after battering Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands on Wednesday.

Maria will move between the east coast of the United States and Bermuda by the middle of next week, "but it is too soon to determine what, if any, direct impacts there might be in these areas," the National Hurricane Center said on Friday.

Hurricane Maria is forecast to weaken gradually over the next few days. (NWS)

As of the 7 p.m. CDT advisory from the National Hurricane Center, the eye of Hurricane Maria was located about 375 miles east-southeast of Nassau in the Bahamas and was moving north-northwest at 9 mph.

On that path the eye of the hurricane will move away from the Turks and Caicos Islands and north and east of the southeastern Bahamas today.

The hurricane center thinks that Maria will then turn more to the north by late Saturday, and that path would keep it away from the continental U.S.

Maria is expected to be steered in between an area of high pressure to its east and a broad area of low pressure to the west. That should shunt it to the north over the next few days.

The hurricane center said forecast models are in agreement over this path initially but diverge a bit after Day 3. At that point some models (the Canadian and the ECMWF) are on the west side of the forecast cone, and the GFS is on the right with a north-northeastward track.

So the hurricane center nudged its official forecast track to the west a bit to account for the spread.

And Maria is expected to lose some of its punch soon.

Maria had winds of 125 mph on Friday night. The hurricane is already being affected by wind shear, and the hurricane center said it will also track over cooler waters that were stirred up by former Hurricane Jose.

This part of the Atlantic has been especially active lately, with Hurricanes Irma, Jose and now Maria tracking over its waters.

All hurricane warnings were dropped on Friday, but a tropical storm warning was in effect for the Turks and Caicos Islands, the southeastern Bahamas and the central Bahamas.

Heavy, flooding rain will also be possible in those areas, with 8-16 inches possible in the Turks and Caicos and 4-8 inches in the Dominican Republic.

Puerto Rico, which was slammed by Maria on Wednesday, could also get an additional 1-3 inches of rain, which could exacerbate flooding there and hinder recovery efforts.

The hurricane center said some spots on the island could get a total of 40 inches of rain from Maria.

Waves churned up by Maria are also expected to reach the southeast coast of the U.S. mainland today, forecasters said.

Those waves could cause dangerous surf and rip currents along the coast for the next few days.

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