Hurricane Bill began life as a tropical depression, first recorded on Saturday, Aug. 15, 2009, in the eastern Atlantic Ocean, about 740 miles southwest of the Cape Verde Islands. By that evening it had become the Atlantic's second tropical storm of the season, with sustained winds of 40 miles per hour.

Bill gained strength slowly over the next day, and on Monday, Aug. 17, was upgraded to a hurricane, with winds of 75 miles per hour. It was then located in the mid-Atlantic, 1,160 miles east of the Lesser Antilles. Over the next 36 hours Bill turned north and gained strength as it howled through the open Atlantic's energizing waters. On Wednesday, its winds hit 135 mph, briefly making Bill a fearsome Category 4 storm.

By Friday, Aug. 21, the National Hurricane Center was projecting a somewhat weaker Bill would pass between Bermuda and the East Coast of the US on Saturday, with neither being hit full force.