The center of Earl is expected to travel across northern Guatemala and the southern Yucatan Peninsula later today and be near the Bay of Campeche Friday night.
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With sustained winds of 120 kilometres per hour, Earl barely attained Category 1 status on the five point Saffir-Simpson scale.
Mexico has dropped all storm advisories associated with Earl and Belize has downgraded hurricane warnings to tropical storm alerts.
Belize opened shelters across the country and cautioned residents to move to higher ground, especially in low-lying areas.
Earl was called late Tuesday morning after a Hurricane Hunter investigation assignment found that an area of low heaviness had formed.
Previous story: Hurricane Earl remains a Category 1 storm this morning with 75 miles per hour winds as it spreads into Central Belize, but forecasters said it is beginning to weaken.
“A tropical storm warning remains in effect for the island”, reads a statement on Go-Jamaica.com.
In its last update on Wednesday, however, the NHC said the Honduran government had eliminated warnings for the coast and the Bay Islands.
Representatives ordered the closure of the city’s global airport while at the same time the archaeological assets and countrywide parks were also closed.
Earl has been upgraded to a hurricane as the system bears down on Belize, threatening flash floods and mud slides. On this track, the center of Earl will be moving very close to the north coast of Honduras late tonight and Wednesday and approach Belize and the Yucatan peninsula late Wednesday.Maximum sustained winds are near 45 miles per hour (75 km/h) with higher gusts. The Belize Tourism Board announced that cruise ship visits had been canceled for this week.
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Hurricane-force winds extend outward up to 25 miles from the center and tropical-storm-force winds extend outward up to 140 miles. Regions of Belize and Guatemala could get as much as 18 inches. Large and damaging waves are expected.
