Hurricane Maria bears down on battered Caribbean

Caribbean island nations still recovering from Irma are bracing for a third hurricane strike in two weeks, while the U.S. Northeast is expected to take a glancing shot from Hurricane Jose.

Hurricane Maria with top winds of 120 miles per hour, was 60 miles east of Martinique and bearing down on Dominica and Guadeloupe in the Caribbean's Leeward Islands, the National Hurricane Center said in an 11 a.m. advisory. It was at Category 3 on the five-step Saffir-Simpson scale and is expected to strengthen later Monday.

Maria follows Harvey which struck the Gulf Coast of Texas and Irma, which rolled over Florida earlier this month. The storms left dozens dead, upended energy and agriculture markets, and caused a combined $143 billion in damages, the second-costliest Atlantic Hurricane season since 1980, according to Enki Research in Savannah, Georgia. While Maria is following a more southerly path, dangerous winds will still reach Barbuda and other islands devastated by Irma.

"Any recovery effort that is going on across these islands will be impacted," said Tyler Roys, a meteorologist at AccuWeather in State College, Pennsylvania.

If the damage estimates hold, 2017 will trail only 2005 in storm costs. That year, a record 28 tropical systems formed in the Atlantic while Katrina devastated New Orleans, according to data from the U.S. National Centers for Environmental Information in Asheville, North Carolina, compiled by Bloomberg.

A hurricane warning is in place on Guadeloupe, Dominica, St. Kitts, Nevis, Montserrat, Martinique, St. Lucia and the U.S. and British Virgin Islands. A tropical storm warning is posted for Antigua, Barbuda, Saba, St. Eustatius, St. Maarten and Anguilla.

Dominica, an island of 75,000 people in the eastern Caribbean, planned to shut schools, businesses and all government offices except emergency services Monday, said Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit in a national address. At least 20 died on the island in 2015 amid heavy flooding when it was struck by Tropical Storm Erika. Storm surge on Dominica and Guadeloupe could reach 9 feet (2.7 meters.)

On its current track, Maria is forecast to strike Puerto Rico's southern coast Wednesday with winds as high as 150 mph and a storm surge that could reach nine feet.

From there, Maria is expected to move into the Bahamas by Saturday retaining much of its strength. Beyond that, its future may depend on other weather systems including Jose, which is forecast to weaken to a tropical storm and linger in the Atlantic after bringing gusty winds and rains across eastern Long Island, Rhode Island and Massachusetts late Tuesday and Wednesday.

"The really interesting thing is how zombie Jose may interact with Hurricane Maria as it moves northward this weekend and early next week," said Todd Crawford, lead meteorologist at The Weather Company in Andover, Massachusetts.