Hurricane Erin: Northeast To See Coastal Flooding, Gusty Coastal Winds And Rip Currents
Erin will stay well offshore, but the oversized hurricane will spread its influence to the Interstate-95 corridor on Thursday and Friday, before moving into the northern Atlantic this weekend.
The biggest threat will be for rip currents on the Atlantic shores. This threat will be highest in the mid-Atlantic to Long Island on Wednesday, but is likely to spread northward along the coast through the rest of the week.
Scores of people have already been rescued from North Carolina rip currents.
(MORE: What A Life Guard Wants You To Know About Rip Currents)
Encompassing all of a hurricane's hazards, rip currents and rough seas have historically made up one-in-six of direct hurricane deaths. It is best to just stay out of the Atlantic this week.
Rip currents can occur even if it is not raining or even windy in your location.
Waves will become increasingly choppy from south to north as Erin makes its way northward. Breaking waves of 5-15 feet are possible from the Jersey Shore to Long Island.
Some coastal flooding is also possible at high tide, especially in favored locations that typically flood in impactful weather events.
While Erin will not make landfall, it could bring gusty winds Thursday into Friday along the Eastern Seaboard. Some seaside locations could see gusts over 40 mph for short periods. Isolated power outages are possible.
The biggest reason that this hurricane will bring impacts to the coast is that Erin's size is expected to grow tremendously before Friday. Erin's diameter of tropical storm force winds will grow from 340 miles across to 550 miles across between Tuesday afternoon and Friday morning.
This expansion stirs up more of the ocean and atmosphere and moves more water toward the U.S. Coastline.
Jonathan Belles has been a digital meteorologist for weather.com for 9 years and also assists in the production of videos for The Weather Channel en español. His favorite weather is tropical weather, but also enjoys covering high-impact weather and news stories and winter storms. He's a two-time graduate of Florida State University and a proud graduate of St. Petersburg College.
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