National Hurricane Center: Tropical Storm Ian’s track is moving west, increasing chances NC will see heavy rain next week | tracker | NOAA – WTVD-TV

RALEIGH, NC (WTVD) — Tropical Storm Ian is gaining strength and moving slightly westward, details that are bad news for North Carolina forecasts

On Sunday morning, the storm system was located just over 600 miles southeast of the western tip of Cuba. It had maximum sustained winds of 50 miles per hour and it was moving west-northwest at 12 miles per hour, according to the National Hurricane Center.

These details represent a slight slowing and a westerly shift — two things that could cause the storm to strengthen and bring more elements to North Carolina.

This is because moving west will keep the storm in warmer waters for longer – giving it a shift to further strengthen – and it could prevent the storm from moving over a major landmass, causing it to would weaken, before hitting Florida.

Moving west would also bring the storm’s center of rotation further inland as it moves north across the United States. This would allow wind and rain from the storm to cover more of North Carolina.

Current projections are that Tropical Storm Ian will become a hurricane later today and upgrade to a major Category 4 storm when it passes Cuba on Tuesday. Ian will then weaken slightly before making landfall somewhere along the Gulf Coast of Florida.

First Alert’s weather team said it was still too early to give details of Ian’s impact on our region, but early indications suggest it will bring heavy rain and wind around Friday and Saturday . Right now this heavy rain would likely dump between 2 and 4 inches in most places in central North Carolina.

Stick with ABC11 as our team monitors all the changes and changes Ian will be making over the next few days.