Hurricane Polo

Hurricane — Category 3 Polo is packing 110-kt (125-mph) winds, moving N at 10 kt (12 mph). Moves inland over the coast Tue as a weakening tropical storm.

At 200 PM MST (2100 UTC), the eye of Hurricane Polo was located near latitude 21.9 North, longitude 114.1 West. Polo is moving toward the north near 12 mph (19 km/h). This motion should continue through tonight followed by a turn toward the northeast on Monday. On the forecast track, Polo is expected to approach the west coast of Baja California Sur on Monday, move across the peninsula Monday night and then approach northwestern mainland Mexico by early Tuesday. Data from a NOAA Hurricane Hunter indicate that the maximum sustained winds are near 125 mph (205 km/h) with higher gusts. Polo is a category 3 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. Fluctuations in strength are possible over the next day or two, but Polo is forecast to be at or near major hurricane strength when it reaches Baja California Sur on Monday, and it is expected to be a hurricane when it makes landfall i— National Hurricane Center · public advisory 29

This is the East Pacific · 19°N–34°N, 116°W–104°W. Polo’s forecast track is the dotted spine — the labelled dots mark its position each day. Every cell is shaded by how many hours it spends inside Polo’s gale-force (≥34 kt · 39 mph) wind across the whole forecast, the damaging core counted double.

Read it two ways at once. Colour is the total — the hours of gale-force wind a place piles up. A slow storm writes its danger in duration, not in any single gust, so the longer the wind sits over a place, the deeper its colour. Opacity is confidence — solid where the official probability of that wind is high, faint where it is only a chance. So a deep, solid cell is a place the wind will work for a long time and likely will; a pale, faint one is a brief, uncertain brush at the edge of the cone.