Wednesday morning, Joaquin intensified to a Category 1 hurricane leaving residents in the New York tri-state area stuck with waterlogged roads and gloomy conditions, while warnings and hurricane watches have been issued in the Bahamas.
The National Weather Service said at about 8 a.m. the storm officially reached hurricane strength after maximum sustained wind speeds topped 75 miles per hour, according to NBC News.
Now that Joaquin has been upgraded to a Category 1 hurricane, it has become the third hurricane in the 2015 Atlantic season.
Regardless of whether the hurricane makes landfall in the U.S. - which some forecasters believe may happen to Maryland and Virginia this weekend - a swath of the East Coast has been put on notice, and are bracing for rain and flooding this week, according to AccuWeather.
Whether or not Joaquin slams into Maryland and Virginia over the weekend, or drifts "harmlessly" past the two states depends on the interaction between Joaquin, a cold front near the East Coast, the remnants of Tropical Storm Ida, a strong bubble of high pressure aloft over the North Atlantic Ocean, and a potentially strong area of low pressure aloft digging into the southeastern U.S. later this week, according to Weather.
Joaquin is expected to move slowly towards the Bahamas Wednesday and Thursday before making its way northward. The extent of the effects on those islands and the surrounding area depends heavily on how close it gets and how much time it spends in the area beforehand.
People along the East Cost from North Carolina into southern New England are advised to make preparations for coastal flooding regardless of how Joaquin acts.
