Stronger Hurricane Bill Likely to Miss U.S.

Hurricane Bill has strengthened since yesterday into a Category Two hurricane, as it continues a northwesterly course from a location east of the Lesser Antilles. The storm is expected to follow a more northerly course, missing the U.S. but possibly impacting Bermuda.

The NOAA's National Hurricane Center reported at 11:00 a.m. AST that Hurricane Bill had maximum sustained winds of 105 mph and was moving west-northwest at 16 miles per hour.

Forecasts suggest that the storm will continue to turn northwest over the next 72 hours, according to RMS (Newark, Calif.), after which Hurricane Bill will take a more northerly track. An RMS source states that there is "complete agreement" across all forecast models that Bill is likely to veer away from the U.S. and remain over open waters in the Atlantic over the next five days. "Most of the models suggest that Bill will remain to the west of Bermuda, however there is a chance that Bermuda will be impacted in four to five days time if the track shifts any further east," the RMS source says.

Given increasingly favorable environmental conditions, it is likely that Bill will steadily intensify and reach its peak intensity as a Category Three hurricane within the next 72 hours, according to RMS.

Anthony O'Donnell has covered technology in the insurance industry since 2000, when he joined the editorial staff of Insurance & Technology. As an editor and reporter for I&T and the InformationWeek Financial Services of TechWeb he has written on all areas of information ... View Full Bio