UPDATE - Hurricane Erin weakens to Category 4 over Atlantic

UPDATES WITH ERIN DROPPING TO CATEGORY 4 STORM; CHANGES HEADLINE, LEDE

By Asiye Latife Yilmaz

ISTANBUL (AA) - Hurricane Erin has weakened to a Category 4 storm after rapidly intensifying earlier Saturday to Category 5 over the Atlantic Ocean, the US National Hurricane Center (NHC) reported.

“On the forecast track, the center of Erin is expected to move just north of the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico through Sunday and pass to the east of the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas Sunday night and Monday,” the NHC said.

The storm’s intensity may fluctuate over the next few days, it added.

Erin went from a Category 1 to a Category 5 hurricane in just over 24 hours, making it one of the fastest intensifying Atlantic storms on record and possibly the quickest to reach such strength before September.

It is not expected to make direct landfall, moving north of Puerto Rico before turning north-northeast into the open Atlantic between the US East Coast and Bermuda this week.

The NHC has warned that the storm will generate dangerous surf and rip currents along the beaches of the Bahamas, much of the US East Coast and Atlantic Canada.

Hurricane Erin became the first hurricane of the 2025 Atlantic season on Friday.