Hurricane watches issued for coastal Maine as massive Lee churns up Atlantic
Hurricane and tropical storm watches have been issued for coastal New England, New Brunswick and southern Nova Scotia as Hurricane Lee stirs rough surf and dangerous rip currents up and down the East Coast of the United States.
AccuWeather meteorologists are urging people from eastern New England to the Canadian Maritimes to complete hurricane preparations early Friday before the large storm approaches this weekend. They are highly confident that Hurricane Lee will make landfall from western Nova Scotia to New Brunswick, with an outside chance of landfall as far west as the Maine this weekend.
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As of Friday morning, the Category 1 storm was packing winds of 85 mph, while unleashing tropical storm conditions in Bermuda. It was 460 miles south-southeast of Nantucket, Massachusetts.
After making a critical turn to the north on Wednesday, Category 1 Hurricane Lee picked up forward speed - now moving to the north at 16 mph. As Lee continues to track closer to Atlantic Canada on Friday, it has already stirred up issues along the East Coast. Earlier this week, Lee was lumbering along to the west-northwest at a mere 3-6 mph. Lee will continue to advance northward toward Nova Scotia and encounter stiffer steering breezes through this weekend.
Lee was a very large tropical system with hurricane-force winds extending outward 105 miles from the center and tropical-storm-force winds extending outward up to 320 miles as of Friday morning.
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This image of Hurricane Lee was captured early Friday morning, Sept. 15, 2023. Clouds from "Large Lee" extended more than 600 miles across. (AccuWeather Enhanced RealVue™ satellite) |
A track into eastern New England has long been in AccuWeather's range of possibilities for Lee. The forecasting team has emphasized the risk of a westward drift with Lee's track for days while, at the same time, sounding the all-clear for Lee's winds and rain farther to the south from New Jersey to Florida.
However, even as the eye of Lee stays to the east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, the sprawling storm will bring dangerous and damaging conditions to much of eastern New England as well as the Maritime Provinces of Canada as it moves northwestward.
Swells radiating outward from Lee will continue to impact the upper mid-Atlantic and New England coast into the weekend and will lead to building seas and surf.
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Winds will increase, seas will build and problems with coastal flooding or storm surge will spread northwestward into eastern New England and the Canadian Maritimes this weekend. Power outages and tree damage are likely. Some roads will become blocked by high water, trees and other dangerous debris and washouts.
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"The worst conditions on Cape Cod will occur late Friday night and Saturday as Lee tracks more than 100 miles to the east Saturday morning," AccuWeather Hurricane Expert Dan Kottlowski said.
"Lee will produce a strong northerly wind into Cape Cod Bay for many hours and all coastal areas near and along the Massachusetts coast will face impacts like that of a powerful nor'easter," Kottlowski added.
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Winds will push water toward the coast, which is associated with a storm surge. Where the water cannot escape easily, it will pile up. In some of the north-facing coastal areas of Massachusetts and the south-facing areas of the Maritimes, especially along the bays, a storm surge of 3-6 feet is anticipated.
As Lee moves into progressively cooler waters along the northeastern United States and Atlantic Canada coast into this weekend, it will lose its core wind intensity slowly. On the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale a drop below Category 1 hurricane intensity (74 mph) is likely prior to landfall.
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"By the time Lee makes landfall, it may not officially be a Category 1 hurricane anymore, but that does not mean that dangers will immediately subside," Kottlowski said. "As the most intense winds drop off, the overall wind and rain field will expand significantly outward."
Lee is expected to be a 1 on the AccuWeather RealImpact™ Scale for Hurricanes in terms of impacts in the United States and Canada due to the magnitude of wind damage, power outages, storm surge flooding, coastal erosion, freshwater flooding and disruptions to commerce and travel expected in the region.
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This gradual unwinding process, or transformation to a tropical rainstorm, is likely around the time of or shortly after landfall, which is estimated to occur Saturday evening, perhaps over southern Nova Scotia.
It should be noted that Superstorm Sandy underwent a similar transition before striking the mid-Atlantic states with devastating consequences in the autumn of 2012. However, while impacts from Lee will bring significant risk to lives and property, it should not bring the same scope of damage that Sandy did.
The high tide cycles during the middle of Friday night and midday Saturday may be some of the most problematic from eastern Massachusetts to southern Maine.
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Farther to the north, Lee will push a significant amount of Atlantic Ocean water into the Bay of Fundy, where astronomical tides are among the greatest in the world -- as much as 50 feet or more -- and the seascape is highly complex. The Bay of Fundy is a body of water that is situated between Canada's New Brunswick and Nova Scotia provinces, and it also reaches the coast of Maine.
As Lee makes landfall, the symmetrical shape of the rain zone will change and shift to the north and west of the storm's center. This anticipated change is common as tropical storms and hurricanes transition to rainstorms.
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Since Lee is picking up forward speed compared to earlier this week, widespread "feet of rain" is not likely. However, because some areas have received rounds of heavy rain in recent days, the ground is saturated. Despite the increase in forward speed, Lee will not move as fast as some tropical systems have done in the past. Enough rain will fall to trigger flash small stream flooding and cause water levels to rise on some of the non-tidal major rivers from Maine to the eastern townships of Quebec, New Brunswick and Nova Scotia due to the scope of the runoff.
Widespread rainfall of 2-4 inches is forecast with pockets of 4-8 inches of rain and an AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 9 inches most likely in eastern and northern Maine to western New Brunswick.
The strongest wind gusts will tend to be near, south and east of the storm's center.
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Winds will be strong enough to trigger widespread power outages in eastern Cape Cod and coastal areas of eastern Maine and western New Brunswick as well as much of Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island. More sporadic power outages are possible as far inland as central New England and northern Maine.
Gusts can reach between 60 and 80 mph across a broad zone that will extend from far eastern coastal Maine eastward through coastal New Brunswick, all of Nova Scotia and most of Prince Edward Island and into the Gulf of St. Lawrence. An AccuWeather Local StormMax™ of 100 mph is possible in the vicinity of the southwestern coast of Nova Scotia.
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In the days leading up to Lee's landfall, offshore seas and surf zone waves will continue to build along much of the U.S. Atlantic coast.
The wave action will not only lead to incidents of beach erosion and minor coastal flooding at times of high tide, but the risk of dangerous and life-threatening rip currents will be ever-present.
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As Hurricane Lee passes 100 miles or more to the west of Bermuda through Friday night, impacts on the islands have been rated "less than 1" on the AccuWeather RealImpact™ Scale for Hurricanes. Gusts to tropical storm force had spread to Bermuda on Thursday morning, with a peak gust to 65 knots (75 mph) Thursday night.
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Elsewhere in the Atlantic, Margot is not likely to affect land. However, a budding tropical system that may later be named Nigel is worth tracking for interests in Bermuda, the U.S. and Canada, as it could become the next hurricane and even major hurricane. The East Coast of the U.S. could be open to impacts, according to AccuWeather forecasters.
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