It seems increasingly unlikely that Hurricane Joaquin, a huge Category 4 storm, plans to stop by the East Coast after drenching the Bahamas, according to the latest forecast from the National Hurricane Center. That means that the Mid-Atlantic, New England, and the Carolinas appear to have avoided the worst-case scenario — but that doesn’t mean that New York isn’t going to be a gloomy, cold, wet, and windy place the next few days, either. The national forecast for the city shows that it is going to be rainy, with temperatures hovering in the 50s, all day on Friday — and all weekend.
However, after the rain ends, the sun is supposed to return; it might get up to the 70s again next Thursday.
Right now, however, it is particularly cold and windy. Per ABC7, today is the coldest day the city has seen since early June.
In regards to Hurricane Joaquin, the National Weather Service warns that there is a chance that severe coastal flooding could happen all along the Eastern Seaboard; or, as the National Hurricane Center ominously puts it, “Swells from a hurricane moving even far offshore of the U.S. east coast can still cause life-threatening surf and rip-current conditions.”
The city is still preparing for whatever weather might come this weekend; the Rockaways are getting ready for expected floods, and Governor Andrew Cuomo put some state emergency operations into effect. Citi Bike stations in areas where there is a high risk of flooding will be out of service, and electricity providers are preparing for downed power lines.
“You have to prepare as if you are gonna have a serious problem, but you don’t want to overprepare to where you spend a lot of money, or you take actions that actually cause a detriment,” Cuomo said yesterday. “And we’re trying to walk that line now.”
Mayor Bill de Blasio canceled a trip to D.C. for a conference because of the storm, and Governor Chris Christie has declared a state of emergency.
You can find the latest city-specific updates on the storm here, and the latest weather forecast from the National Weather Service here.
