A hurricane has formed in the Atlantic - in the middle of January
A rare January hurricane formed far out in the Atlantic is the first to form during the month since 1938, US officials say.
Hurricane Alex’s maximum sustained winds were near 85 mph. A hurricane warning was issued for Portugal’s mid-Atlantic Azores islands, where the Civil Protection Service issued a weather red alert, the highest of four warnings that indicates extreme risk, for five of the archipelago’s nine islands.
It said residents should expect waves of up to 18 metres high and wind gusts up to 100 mph.
The US National Hurricane Centre in Miami said in a Facebook post that there has not been a hurricane present during the month of January since 1955, when Alice formed in late December 1954 and carried over into the next month.
The hurricane was centred about 490 miles south of Faial Island in the central Azores and was moving north-east. Alex was expected to move near or over parts of the Azores on Friday, according to the Centre.
The Azores government has advised nurseries to stay closed and told residents to ensure drainage systems are not blocked.
The archipelago, which has a population of around 250,000, has been threatened by hurricanes before but they usually lose their strength as they move into colder northern water.
Alex formed only days after a rare event in the Pacific. An El Nino-related tropical storm formed south-west of Hawaii last week. Tropical Storm Pali, only the third such system to develop in January in over 40 years, had weakened to a depression by Thursday and is expected to dissipate.
