A re-energized Tropical Storm Cristobal on Saturday advanced toward the US Gulf Coast, spawning a tornado in Florida and bringing the heavy rains that already caused flooding and mudslides in Mexico and Central America.
After weakening to a tropical depression while moving over land in Mexico’s Gulf coast, Cristobal on Friday headed back into the southern Gulf of Mexico from the Yucatan Peninsula and powered back up into a tropical storm.
Forecasters said it would arrive on US soil late yesterday, but was not expected to grow into a hurricane.
Photo: Reuters
The US National Hurricane Center in Miami said the storm was expected to slowly strengthen until making landfall last night along the US Gulf Coast.
However, the storm already made its presence felt on Saturday evening, spawning a tornado that touched down near downtown Orlando, Florida, the US National Weather Service said.
The twister just missed a group of protesters at Lake Eola at about 7:30pm. There appeared to be no injuries, but tree limbs were knocked down, and there were reports of power outages.
“Yes, it is related to the tropical storm that is well to our west,” said Scott Kelly, a meteorologist with the weather service in Melbourne, Florida. “But the tropical storm provided a lot of low-level shear and that has allowed for some tornadoes to form over Central Florida.”
The threat for tornadoes would continue overnight, he said.
Cristobal’s maximum sustained winds had strengthened to 85kph by early Saturday and it was moving north at 19kph.
The hurricane center said the storm could cause heavy rains from East Texas to Florida into early this week.
A tropical storm watch was posted for the northern Gulf of Mexico coast from Intracoastal City, Louisiana, to the Alabama-Florida border.
Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards has declared a state of emergency to prepare for the storm’s possible arrival.
“Now is the time to make your plans, which should include the traditional emergency items along with masks and hand sanitizer as we continue to battle the coronavirus pandemic,” Edward said in a statement released on Thursday.
The hurricane center’s forecast path puts Alabama on Cristobal’s east side, far from where the center was expected to come ashore. Still, the southwest part of the state was expected to get gusty winds, heavy rain, storm surge and possibly tornadoes as the storm moved closer to the coast.
“Sunday will be very wet and windy as Cristobal passes west of the area, placing the central Gulf Coast on the ‘dirty’ eastern side of the storm,” the weather service said.
James Watson — the Nobel laureate co-credited with the pivotal discovery of DNA’s double-helix structure, but whose career was later tainted by his repeated racist remarks — has died, his former lab said on Friday. He was 97. The eminent biologist died on Thursday in hospice care on Long Island in New York, announced the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, where he was based for much of his career. Watson became among the 20th century’s most storied scientists for his 1953 breakthrough discovery of the double helix with researcher partner Francis Crick. Along with Crick and Maurice Wilkins, he shared the
OUTRAGE: The former strongman was accused of corruption and responsibility for the killings of hundreds of thousands of political opponents during his time in office Indonesia yesterday awarded the title of national hero to late president Suharto, provoking outrage from rights groups who said the move was an attempt to whitewash decades of human rights abuses and corruption that took place during his 32 years in power. Suharto was a US ally during the Cold War who presided over decades of authoritarian rule, during which up to 1 million political opponents were killed, until he was toppled by protests in 1998. He was one of 10 people recognized by Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto in a televised ceremony held at the presidential palace in Jakarta to mark National
US President Donald Trump handed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban a one-year exemption from sanctions for buying Russian oil and gas after the close right-wing allies held a chummy White House meeting on Friday. Trump slapped sanctions on Moscow’s two largest oil companies last month after losing patience with Russian President Vladimir Putin over his refusal to end the nearly four-year-old invasion of Ukraine. However, while Trump has pushed other European countries to stop buying oil that he says funds Moscow’s war machine, Orban used his first trip to the White House since Trump’s return to power to push for
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr yesterday vowed that those behind bogus flood control projects would be arrested before Christmas, days after deadly back-to-back typhoons left swathes of the country underwater. Scores of construction firm owners, government officials and lawmakers — including Marcos’ cousin congressman — have been accused of pocketing funds for substandard or so-called “ghost” infrastructure projects. The Philippine Department of Finance has estimated the nation’s economy lost up to 118.5 billion pesos (US$2 billion) since 2023 due to corruption in flood control projects. Criminal cases against most of the people implicated are nearly complete, Marcos told reporters. “We don’t file cases for
RSS