"How do you solve a problem like Maria?"
- from Maria in the Sound of Music
- WESTWARD SHIFT: Computer model trends past 24 hours are depicting a significant westward shift in Maria's track toward North Carolina's Outer Banks.
- CONE OF UNCERTAINTY: The National Hurricane Center's official track has also moved notably west, from solutions earlier this week that were all out to sea.
- EXPANDED EFFECTS: A strong and large but slowly weakening tropical system results in an expansion of the wind field. A wider area will experience tropical-storm force winds than if the storm was very strong with a tightly-compacted wind core.
- IMPACTS FOR MID-ATLANTIC COAST? Coastal communities from South Carolina to New Jersey will experience 72+ hours of large and increasing swells, persistent onshore easterly winds, water levels rising with each tide cycle and probable flooding in low-lying areas.
