Due to uncertainty, prudent mariners follow the 3-2-1 rule: Three days ahead of a hurricane’s forecasted position, stay three hundred miles away; two days ahead, keep out of a two-hundred-mile radius of its projected center; one day ahead, stay one hundred miles away from its eye in all directions. The rule is based on the fact that hurricane paths are erratic and unpredictable, so it’s smart to give the system a wide berth.

