Hurricane Irma intensified into a monstrous storm on Tuesday, Sept. 5, with wind speeds of over 180 mph, making it the most powerful Atlantic storm ever recorded outside the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean, according to an 11 a.m. advisory from the National Hurricane Center (NHC).
Irma was upgraded at a Category 5 Hurricane earlier on Tuesday, with winds well above the 157 mph threshold for the category. Irma was moving toward the Leeward Islands at 14 mph as of the 11 a.m. advisory. The NHC called it an “extremely dangerous storm.”
Irma is a “Cape Verde hurricane,” which are known to be especially intense. Cape Verde hurricanes form far out over the Atlantic Ocean near the Cape Verde Islands. They then travel all the way over the Atlantic, according to CNN meteorologist Brandon Miller.
