Hurricane Rafael forms in Caribbean as it approaches Cayman Islands, heads toward Cuba

Rafael, the 18th named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season, became a hurricane on Tuesday evening as it approached the Cayman Islands, the National Hurricane Center said.  

A Category 1 hurricane, Rafael reached maximum sustained winds near 75 mph based on recent data from aircraft reconnaissance, the National Hurricane Center said in a 7:20 p.m. ET advisory. 

The center of the hurricane is located 20 miles southeast of Little Cayman in the Caribbean Sea, and 305 southeast of Havana, Cuba. Damaging hurricane-force winds, a dangerous storm surge and destructive waves are expected, forecasters said, with the storm expected to strengthen before reaching Cuba. It was moving northwest at 15 mph. 

The Miami-based hurricane center said the system was expected to approach the northwest part of Cuba around the time it reaches hurricane strength. A map charting Rafael’s projected path through the Caribbean, created by CBS News meteorologist Nikki Nolan, shows the storm nearing Cuba Wednesday morning with maximum sustained winds of 85 miles per hour.

“Steady to rapid intensification is forecast over the next 24 to 36 hours, and Rafael is forecast to become a hurricane in the northwestern Caribbean near the Cayman Islands with further strengthening before it makes landfall in Cuba,” forecasters said in an update early Tuesday morning.

The hurricane center said the heaviest rainfall was forecast to hit Jamaica on Tuesday, with Cuba likely to face a strengthened storm by Wednesday. Rainfall will likely be accompanied by hurricane conditions in the Cayman Islands by Tuesday afternoon and possibly in western Cuba and the Isle of Youth by Wednesday. 

“Heavy rainfall will impact areas of the Western Caribbean through early Thursday, particularly across Jamaica and the Cayman Islands into southern and western portions of Cuba where rainfall totals between 3 to 6 inches are expected,” the hurricane center said Tuesday morning, adding that “isolated higher totals up to 10 inches” could be seen in some parts of Jamaica and Cuba.

Heavy rainfall was expected to spread north into Florida and elsewhere in the southeast U.S. by the middle or end of the week, with as much as 3 inches forecast for the lower and middle Florida Keys.

CBS News meteorologist Nicolette Nolan said forecasting models weren’t clear enough as of Monday to predict where Rafael would head once it reaches the Gulf of Mexico, “but the Gulf coasts from Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida need to be on alert for impacts at the end of the week.”