This striking image from space captures the monstrous scale of Hurricane Irma
Irma, the strongest Atlantic hurricane in recorded history, hit several Caribbean islands as a "potentially catastrophic" Category 5 storm Wednesday.
Meanwhile, tropical storms Jose and Katia are also brewing nearby. Jose, the 10th tropical storm of this year's hurricane season, is expected to become a hurricane late Wednesday.
Just before noon ET Wednesday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) captured a breathtaking, yet horrifying, photo of the three storms from space, using its GOES-16 satellite:
Travelling from east to west, you can see tropical storm Katia near the Gulf of Mexico, Hurricane Irma in the Caribbean, and tropical storm Jose over the Atlantic.
Jose is currently about 1,135 miles east of the Lesser Antilles, an archipelago in the Caribbean Sea, with maximum sustained wind speeds of 70 mph. It's moving at around 17 mph as of Wednesday morning.
Katia, currently about 135 miles east-southeast of Tampico, Mexico, is not projected to move much in the next several days. It may bring 5 to 10 inches of rainfall over northern Veracruz, and up to 15 inches in concentrated areas, according to the Weather Company.
The above images show the monstrous scale of Irma, which has sustained wind speeds of 185 mph for over 24 hours. In Barbuda, an island east of Puerto Rico, winds ripped off the roof of a police station, forcing officers to take shelter in a nearby fire station, the AP reported Wednesday.
As of Wednesday morning, the National Hurricane Center projects that the centerline of the Category 5 storm will travel up the east coast of Florida. The hurricane's span, which measures around 400 miles wide, is big enough to affect the entire state.
Irma's exact path is still uncertain, but the latest forecasts suggest that the hurricane will hit South Florida this weekend. US and state officials are declaring a state of emergency for Florida in anticipation of the storm.