The projected path for Hurricane Rafael, which on Wednesday is a Category 2 hurricane over Cuba, has changed dramatically. Since predictions on Monday that believed it would make landfall in the United States near Louisiana, the models for November 6 have a large spread for the storm’s track over the next seven days. Various weather experts and trackers do not agree on where it is heading, apart from the fact that it is moving toward the center of the Gulf of Mexico. Here’s what we know so far about the path for Hurricane Rafael for the rest of the week.
What is the path of Hurricane Rafael?
While most trackers still have Hurricane Rafael moving past Florida and toward Louisiana, conditions in the Caribbean have many models predicting that it will move further west toward Mexico and Texas.
Compared to models earlier in the week, Hurricane Rafael has trended westward, though the range of its path has swung wildly. As shown by the tracker from the National Center of Atmospheric Research (NCAR) above, the possible paths goes as far south as the Bay of Campeche and as far east as Florida.
The good news is that the hurricane is still predicted to weaken in strength to a tropical storm or tropical depression when it finally makes landfall in Mexico or the US.
One of the most persistent models comes from a Wednesday report by Accuweather, which believes that the storm will move west before ultimately turning north and hitting the center of Louisiana by 7PM ET on Monday.
Meanwhile, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) has changed its model, stating in a report on Wednesday at 10 AM ET that it will still be in the Gulf on Monday. It predicts that the storm will head toward the coastal border between Mexico and Texas several days past that, seeing it dissipate more harmlessly in the Gulf before reaching land.
