A trio of hurricanes is churning in the Atlantic basin
— -- Meet Irma, Jose and Katia, the three hurricanes churning in the Atlantic basin.
Hurricane Irma — a Category 5 storm — poses the most imminent threat as it bears down on the Caribbean, with maximum sustained winds of 185 mph, before it is expected to take a turn to the north and threaten the U.S., according to the National Hurricane Center (NHC).
On Wednesday afternoon, the NHC announced that the "quickly strengthening Jose" was upgraded from a tropical storm to a Category 1 hurrican. As of 5 p.m., Jose was moving west-northwest at 16 mph, with maximum sustained winds of 75 mph.
No coastal watches or warnings are in effect for Jose at this time, according to the NHC.
Hurricane Katia is forming in the southwestern Gulf of Mexico, according to the NHC. As of 5 p.m., it was moving southeast at 3 mph and had maximum sustained winds of 75 mph.
The Mexican government has issued a hurricane watch for the coast in the state of Veracruz, from Tuxpan to Laguna Verde, according to the NHC.
This isn't the first time there have been three hurricanes at once in the Atlantic basin.
The last time three hurricanes were brewing in the Atlantic at the same time was in September 2010, Philip Klotzbach, a meteorologist at Colorado State University, tweeted on Aug. 31.
That set of hurricanes included Hurricane Igor, which struck Bermuda as a Category 1 storm and then the Canadian island of Newfoundland as a tropical cyclone, according to the NHC.
In the 1998 season, four hurricanes were in the Atlantic at the same time, including Hurricane Georges, a Category 4 storm that killed more than 600 people in the Dominican Republic and Haiti and caused $2.8 billion in damage in the U.S., the Weather Channel reported.
It has been an active 2017 hurricane season.
Irma poses a serious threat to Florida about two weeks after Hurricane Harvey made landfall on Texas as a Category 4 storm, causing record flooding in Houston and other areas.
