Hurricane brewing in Atlantic

 Katia became the second named hurricane of the season in the Atlantic Ocean on Wednesday, but forecasters said it was too soon to determine where it might head.

 The National Hurricane Center in Miami cautioned the public – still recovering along parts of the East Coast from Irene – not to stress over the storm.

 It is over warm waters and in a low wind shear environment, two ingredients that could propel it to become a major hurricane, likely by the weekend. But it’s too soon to tell if it will ever come near land.

 “It’s got a lot of ocean to go. There’s no way at this point to say if it will make any impacts, let alone when it might make them,” said Dennis Feltgen, a meteorologist and spokesman at the National Hurricane Center.

 “There’s a reason we don’t do forecasts more than five days in advance – the information just isn’t good. The error beyond that just isn’t acceptable.”

 As of 11 p.m. EDT, Katia was still centered about 1,800 miles east of the Leeward Islands and was moving west-northwest near 20 mph. Maximum sustained winds were 75 mph.

 Also becoming an area of concern is a thunderstorm cluster over the southeastern Gulf of Mexico. It has a high chance of becoming a tropical storm in the next two days, the hurricane center said.

 National Weather Service meteorologist Fred Zeigler said the system could bring rain to coastal Mississippi and Louisiana but it’s too early to tell whether it will mean anything worse.

Associated Press