The World - News from Sept. 23, 1988

Hurricane Helene, packing 110 m.p.h. winds, began surging through the open Atlantic, veering away from the path of its predecessor, Gilbert. Helene’s center was about 1,000 miles east of Barbados, and the storm was moving west-northwest at about 10 m.p.h. The system had been moving west for the past three days but turned north because of a weakness in a high pressure system. Forecasters said there was no way to determine whether the high-pressure weakness would remain long enough for the storm to blow itself out in the open north Atlantic or if it would resume a westerly course toward land. Gilbert left more than a hundred dead as it raked across the Caribbean last week.