Marie brings surf; Lowell’s remnants may cut off tradewinds
This composite satellite image taken Monday morning shows Hurricane Marie off the Mexican coast, remnants of former Tropical Storm Lowell northwest of Marie and Tropical Depression Karina to Lowell's southwest.
NASA's Aqua satellite captured this visible image of Hurricane Marie of the west coast of Mexico on Sunday.
NOAA's GOES-West satellite captured a visible image of Lowell's remnants on Sunday.
This infrared image from NOAA's GOES-West satellite taken early Monday morning shows former Tropical Storm Karina as a small area of clouds compared to massive Hurricane Marie to the east.
Powerful Hurricane Marie kicked high swells along Mexico’s northern Pacific coast on Monday, even as it weakened slightly to a Category 4 storm. Also in the Eastern Pacific, Karina weakened to a tropical depression Monday and forecasters said remnants of Lowell may move north of Hawaii later this week and cut off the cooling tradewinds.
Lowell is expected to be north of Hawaii by Thursday. Weakened tradewinds will likely allow clouds to build up during the day and bring afternoon showers in leeward areas, in addition to the windward and mauka showers into the Labor Day weekend, forecasters said.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Hurricane Marie would likely raise waves along Southern California later in the week. Forecasters said waves generated by Lowell are bringing a moderate east swell to Hawaii that could rise to advisory levels Wednesday or Thursday. Surf from Hurricane Marie is also expected to boost the east swell here through the weekend.
The Miami-based Hurricane Center in Miami said that on Monday afternoon Marie had sustained winds of up to 135 mph and was located about 490 miles southwest of the southern tip of Baja California. It said the storm was moving northwest at 13 mph.
Swells provoked by the storm were affecting much of Mexico’s Pacific coast and the Hurricane Center warned of dangerous surf and rip current conditions.
Hurricane-force winds extended up to 60 miles away from the storm’s center, with tropical storm-force winds reaching out to 310 miles.
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The southern Pacific coast state of Oaxaca requested federal disaster relief after about 10,000 homes were either damaged, flooded or cut off by mudslides on the state’s mountainous rural roads due to rains associated with Marie last week. One man was injured in a mudslide but there were no reported deaths, the state government said late Sunday.
The government of Baja California Sur, closer to the hurricane’s current location, said it would cancel some classes in the resort cities of Los Cabos as a precautionary measure.
Meanwhile, Tropical Depression Karina was about 1,215 miles west-southwest of Baja, California at 11 a.m. with winds of 35 mph. The storm was moving east at 9 mph and is expected to dissipate over the next couple of days and be absorbed into the larger Hurricane Marie.
