Hurricane Florence's Slow Speed Is Ominous

There’s something particularly worrying about the forecast for Hurricane Florence—and it’s not only that the storm will likely make landfall later this week as a life-threatening major hurricane.

Over the next two days, the winds that guide the movement of storms across Earth’s surface—winds that meteorologists call “steering currents”—will push Florence over a patch of extremely warm ocean and shunt it toward the United States. It will feed on these waters, gaining strength, so much so that by Wednesday evening. Meanwhile, the eye of the storm will come within striking distance of the coast