Fred may regain tropical storm strength as it nears Florida

HAVANA (AP) — Tropical slump Fred was moving on Cuba’s bluish seashore and could regain tropical tempest presumption arsenic it pulls distant from the land connected Friday, up of its projected way towards the Florida Keys connected Saturday and southwest Florida connected Sunday, forecasters said.

Meanwhile, inactive eastbound of the Caribbean Sea, forecasters were watching a disturbance that they said would apt go Grace, the seventh named tempest of the Atlantic hurricane season. Island governments issued a Tropical Storm Watch for Antigua and Barbuda, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Montserrat. Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands besides were warned to show its progress.

The Miami-based National Hurricane Center said Fred had maximum sustained winds of 35 mph (55 kph) and was dropping dense rainfall implicit parts of Cuba, wherever the main threats were rainfall and flooding. A tropical tempest informing was issued Friday greeting for the Florida Keys and Florida Bay, and a ticker was successful spot for southwest Florida.

The hurricane halfway said 3 to 7 inches (7.5 to 18 centimeters) of rainfall were expected crossed the Florida Keys and confederate peninsula by Monday, with isolated maximums of 10 inches (25 centimeters).

No evacuations are planned for tourists oregon residents successful Monroe County, Keys officials said Friday. The county’s exigency absorption officials are advising radical successful campgrounds, recreational vehicles, question trailers, live-aboard vessels and mobile homes to question structure successful a harmless operation during the storm.

Once a tropical storm, Fred weakened backmost to a slump by its rotation implicit Haiti and the Dominican Republic, wherever it knocked retired powerfulness to immoderate 400,000 customers and caused flooding that forced officials to unopen down portion of the country’s aqueduct system, interrupting h2o work for hundreds of thousands of people. Local officials reported hundreds of radical were evacuated and immoderate buildings were damaged.

Fred’s halfway was astir 245 miles (390 kilometers) southeast of Key West, Florida. That was besides astir 40 miles (65 kilometers) east-southwest of Caibarien, Cuba. It was inactive headed west-northwest astatine 12 mph (19 kph).

The strategy was expected to nutrient 3 to 5 inches (7.5 to 12.5 centimeters) of rainfall crossed the Dominican Republic and the occidental Bahamas, arsenic good arsenic 1 to 3 inches (2.5 to 7.5 centimeters) implicit Haiti, the Turks and Caicos, the eastbound Bahamas, and Cuba.

Fred became the sixth named tempest of the Atlantic hurricane play precocious Tuesday arsenic it moved past the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.