Hurricane Helene Tracks Gilbert

MIAMI — Hurricane Helene was born in the Atlantic today, and forecasters warned that it was roaring across the open sea on nearly the same path taken by the century’s most powerful storm, Hurricane Gilbert.

Helene, packing winds of up to 85 m.p.h., posed no immediate threat to land, but NASA officials at Cape Canaveral, Fla., were keeping a close watch on the storm’s movements as they prepared for the Sept. 29 launch of the space shuttle Discovery. Helene was centered this morning about 1,300 miles east of the island of Barbados.