August 6, 2000 | ||||||||
Alberto is first 2000 hurricane Alberto becomes first hurricane of the Atlantic season ASSOCIATED PRESS
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Alberto grew Saturday from a tropical storm to become the first hurricane of the Atlantic season, but was not expected to threaten any land anytime soon, forecasters said. The storm weakened earlier Saturday before regaining strength to cross the 74 mph top sustained winds threshold and become Hurricane Alberto, said Miles Lawrence, a hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami. ''It's no threat to land for several days,'' Lawrence said. ''At some point it might be, but not any time soon.'' At 11 p.m. EDT Saturday, Alberto was centered about 625 miles west of the southernmost Cape Verde Islands - at 14.6 north latitude, 34.1 west longitude, and was moving west at near 17 mph. Top sustained winds were at 75 mph. Alberto was about 3,200 miles southeast of Florida, said Stacy Stewart, a hurricane specialist with the hurricane center. While hurricane forecasts normally are considered fairly accurate up to three days, it was still too early to predict if Alberto might ever threaten the United States or the Caribbean. ''It's just one of many (storm) systems of a similar kind that come across the Atlantic, and whether or not they actually make it all the way across and threaten land, we'll just have to wait and see,'' Lawrence said. Earlier, Lixion Avila, also at the hurricane center, agreed Alberto has a long way to go. ''We'll be watching this one for probably another week and a half or so,'' Avila said.
''We are forecasting it to strengthen a little bit - but not much - over the next three days, '' he said. ''Most anything could happen."
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