Storm Isaias in Annapolis, Maryland on August 4, 2020. -

Baltimore Sun / TNS / Sipa USA / SIPA

Tropical Storm Delta reached the Caribbean on Monday and turned into a hurricane, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) said, adding that it is expected to reach high intensity as it passes over Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula on Tuesday, before arriving in the southern United States during the week.

With sustained winds of up to 130km / h and even stronger gusts in southwest Jamaica, storm Delta is now heading towards the coasts of the United States of the Gulf of Mexico (Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana and Texas) at a speed of 11km / h, the meteorological service informed.

Here are the Key Messages for rapidly intensifying #Hurricane #Delta this late Monday evening.

The latest advisory is at https://t.co/tW4KeFW0gB pic.twitter.com/DOpvSBFm8A

- National Hurricane Center (@NHC_Atlantic) October 6, 2020

Almost 36 hours of vigilance for Mexico

"We expect further rapid acceleration (Tuesday), and we expect Delta to be a high intensity hurricane as it approaches the Yucatan Peninsula," the NHC said in its 12 noon GMT Tuesday bulletin.

High intensity hurricanes are those belonging to categories 3 to 5, on a scale of up to 5, with winds of more than 178 km / h.

The northern tip of Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula is affected by this vigilance, the NHC said, which means the region will experience dangerous conditions within the next 36 hours.

On track, Delta's Eye is expected to approach northeastern Yucatan overnight on Tuesday and enter the Gulf of Mexico early Wednesday.

Without obstacle to slow it down, it will reach between Thursday evening and Friday morning the southern United States at an as yet undetermined point in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi or Alabama.

The tenth tropical cyclone of the season

Delta is the 26th storm with one name in an unusually choppy Atlantic hurricane season in which several records have been broken, including the exhaustion of the list of expected names for cyclones.

This is why meteorologists began to identify them using the Greek alphabet.

In addition, "it will become the 10th tropical cyclone of the season" to make landfall, wrote meteorologist MJ Ventrice of The Weather Company on Twitter.

“It would break the record for the most tropical cyclones making landfall in a single season,” he added.

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