The Bottom- In an update sent out on 11 PM on Tuesday night, September 19th, the KNMI warns that Saba will continue to see hurricane conditions over the next few hours. According to KNMI, the effects of Hurricane Maria have by now lessened on St. Eustatius.

At 1100 PM AST (0300 UTC), the center of Hurricane Maria was located near latitude 17.3 North, longitude 64.7 West. Maria is moving toward the west-northwest near 10 mph (17 km/h). A west-northwest to northwest motion is expected to continue through Wednesday night, followed by a northwestward motion on Thursday. On the forecast track, the eye of Maria has passed St. Eustatius and Saba well south.

Maximum sustained winds near the centre, 175 mph (280 km/h) with higher gusts. Maria is a potentially catastrophic category 5 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale. Some fluctuations in intensity could occur before the hurricane reaches Puerto Rico, but Maria is forecast to remain an extremely dangerous category 4 or 5 hurricane as it moves near or over the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

On the forecast track, the closest proximity to St. Eustatius was foreseen to be 133 km (83 mi) to the SW at 17:00 AST this afternoon, the closest proximity to Saba is now 160 km (99 mi) and Statia 184km (114 mi) to the SW at 23:00 AST.

According to KNMI, Maria is now moving away from the islands. In Maria’s northeastern quadrant, hurricane-force winds currently extend outward up to 95 km (60 mi) from the center and tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 240 km (150 mi). Although TS conditions are no longer present on Statia, Saba seems to remain in TS/Hurricane conditions the next few hours”.