Philippe to become Category 1 hurricane this week; Rina downgraded
Tropical Storm Philippe is expected to become a Category 1 hurricane later this week with top winds of 85 mph, while a weakening Rina was downgraded to a tropical depression on Sunday.
The two neighboring tropical systems had interacted last week in an uncommon phenomenon in the Atlantic. The Fujiwhara Effect is a binary interaction where two tropical cyclones within 345 miles to about 860 miles of each other start to spin around a common point, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The bigger of the two sometimes absorbs the smaller storm, or the smaller storm “will...