MIAMI, (Reuters) – Tropical Storm Emily formed near the Caribbean’s Lesser Antilles islands yetserday, far from oil and gas-production facilities in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.
The Miami-based National Hurricane Center said Emily, the fifth named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, was packing maximum sustained winds of 40 miles per hour (65 kph). It was located about 50 miles (80 km) west-southwest of Dominica and was on a track across the northeastern Caribbean to approach the island of Hispaniola, shared by the Dominican Republic and Haiti, tonight, the hurricane center said.
The storm threatened to dump heavy rain on both Hispaniola and Puerto Rico but posed no immediate threat to oil and gas production facilities in the U.S. Gulf of Mexico.
The hurricane center said Emily could intensify to hurricane strength by the end of this week. Even if that happened, the storm was unlikely to strengthen into more than a low-level Category 1 hurricane, however.