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This NOAA satellite image taken Tuesday, October 16, 2012 at 10:45 AM EDT shows Hurricane Rafael with maximum sustained winds of 85 mph. A low pressure system over the Northeast with cloudy conditions and showers. Farther west, rain showers and cloudy conditions are over Texas. Farther north, showers and cloudy conditions are moving into the Great Lakes.
LOS CABOS, Mexico—Tropical Storm Paul spun northward off the southern half of Mexico's Baja peninsula early Wednesday, after veering away from a landfall on a sparsely populated stretch of coast.

Forecasters said the storm could cross the small Vizcaino Desert peninsula that hooks into the Pacific sometime Wednesday afternoon, then turn northwestward and head back out to sea.

Paul started Tuesday as a hurricane but it rapidly lost strength as it headed toward Baja, preceded by rains that caused some minor flooding at the peninsula's southern tip.

The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Paul's maximum sustained winds had decreased to 60 mph (95 kph) Tuesday night. It was moving north at 12 mph (19 kph).

A tropical storm warning was in effect for the western coast from Santa Fe north to El Pocito and in the east from San Evaristo to Bahia San Juan Bautista.

In the Atlantic, Hurricane Rafael buffeted Bermuda with wind and rain while it stayed out to sea to the east of the British territory.