Hurricane Elsa strengthened significantly Friday morning, becoming the first hurricane of the 2021 season.
It is the third storm of the season to threaten the US coastline, potentially nearing the Florida Peninsula by next week, including around the site of the deadly Surfside condo collapse.
Elsa has sustained winds of 85 mph, with gusts up to 105 mph, the National Hurricane Center said. At 8 p.m. ET, the Category 1 storm was racing west at 30 miles per hour, about 800 miles east-southeast of Kingston, Jamaica.
A hurricane warning is in effect for Jamaica
, the southern portion of Haiti from Port Au Prince to the southern border with the Dominican Republic, and the southern coast of the Dominican Republic from Punta Palenque to the border with Haiti.