Hurricane Karl

Hurricane Karl made it to major hurricane status, Category 3. According to the definition from NOAA, a Category Three Hurricane has sustained winds of 111-130 mph, 96-113 kt, or 178-209 km/hr. Severity means that Devastating damage will occur.
Let's hope not. The forecast puts Karl onto the Mexican coast mid-day today.

via Tropical Weather : Weather Underground
A note on names.

• There was another Hurricane Karl back in 1998. It didn't amount to much. 
• There are six sets of names for Atlantic hurricanes. The names are used in cycle unless one is particularly devastating. Then, the name is retired. For that reason, there will be only one Katrina, Hortense, Klaus, or Bob. 
• Hurricanes before 1950 didn't have names. The phonetic alphabet (Able, Baker, Charley) was used initially. Starting in 1953, the storms were given women's names. The common comment then was that the storms were unpredictable in direction or intensity. Possibly responding to a dope-slap from some meteorologist's  mother, male names were introduced, first in the Pacific.