Hurricane Alex 2016: Forecast, Storm Tracker, Path and Updates

The Government of the Azores has declared a state of emergency for Friday, January 15, following warnings that tropical storm Alex, a ‘category 1′ hurricane, is expected to hit the islands hard.

Hurricane Alex is certainly out of the ordinary. According to the NHC, the Atlantic hurricane season typically runs from June 1 to November 30, and the first named storm normally appears in July.

Alex is the first January hurricane to form since 1938 and only the fourth January hurricane on record since 1851, CNN reported.

Wind: Tropical-storm-force winds are expected to begin over portions of the Azores tonight. An El Niño-related tropical storm formed south-west of Hawaii last week.

Hurricane warnings were in effect for islands in the central Azores, including Faial, Pico, Sao Jorge, Graciosa and Terceira.

Hurricane force winds extend 25 miles from its centre, with tropical storm force winds 150 miles from its centre.

Officials said residents should expect waves up to 60 feet high and wind gusts up to 100 miles per hour.

The MODIS instrument onboard NASA’s Aqua satellite captured this true-colour image of Hurricane Alex off the mid-Atlantic coast on August 4, 2004.

“Remarkably, Alex has undergone the transformation into a hurricane”. However, the contrast between the surface waters and unusually cold air at high altitudes has created a volatile corridor of air fostering the storm’s development. It’s even less common when such a storm strengthens into a hurricane, which often thrive most over warm waters. Alex is expected to weaken after plowing through the Azores and becomes extratropical late Friday. Alex has the potential to transform back into a non-tropical low-pressure system by the time it reaches the Azores, according to The Weather Channel.

As of Thursday morning, there was no expectation that Alex will directly strike the US or mainland Europe; it was predicted to head north, approaching Greenland early Sunday morning.