Hurricane Kirk - the 11th storm of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season - reached Category 4 intensity on October 3, according to the Fox Weather hurricane forecasting center.
Hurricane forecaster Philip Klotzbach of Colorado State University, USA, said that Hurricane Kirk is the strongest storm at this time (early October) of the Atlantic hurricane season, since Hurricane Iota in 2020.
In addition, Kirk is the third Category 4 to 5 Atlantic hurricane so far this year, after Hurricane Beryl and Hurricane Helene.
In the satellite era since 1966, there have been 6 years with more than 3 Category 4 to 5 hurricanes in the Atlantic as of October 3, including: 1999, 2004, 2005, 2010, 2017, 2023.
Kirk is expected to affect areas such as the UK and France, causing heavy rain, rough seas and dangerous gusts of wind.
According to hurricane forecast models, Kirk's landfall is expected to occur next week as the storm loses heat from the warm Atlantic and becomes a tropical depression.
Fox Weather forecasters stressed that Kirk will not sweep across North America but will still have some impact on the weather there.
Kirk began appearing in the central Atlantic on September 29 and quickly strengthened into a Category 3 hurricane a few days later.
According to the Fox Weather Hurricane Center, due to the direction of the subtropical depression and a large low pressure trough, Kirk's path will not pass through areas such as Bermuda, the Bahamas and the United States.
However, due to Kirk's large size, the storm's winds will affect a range of over 320km. The US National Hurricane Center warns that large waves from the latest Atlantic storm could impact the U.S. East Coast even though the storm is hundreds of miles from North America.
According to Fox News' hurricane bulletin, Kirk's impact is expected to be limited to Europe as the storm has turned into a tropical depression.
According to forecast models, the remnant rainfall from Kirk could reach 130mm as the core of the system approaches Europe next week.
Kirk's remnants could challenge some records previously set by systems originating from hurricanes, hurricane and depression experts note.
Hurricane Ophelia in 2017 was considered one of the worst storms to hit the UK in decades, with many deaths and damage reaching hundreds of millions of USD.
