The Philadelphia Eagles and Washington Redskins are currently scheduled to play their Week 4 game at 1:00 PM ET on Sunday, Oct. 4 at FedEx Field in Washington D.C. Landover, Maryland. That might change, however.
According to Mask Maske of The Washington Post, Hurricane Joaquin is forcing the NFL to have contingency if the game cannot be played as scheduled due to dangerous weather.
NFL officials are in discussions with representatives of the Washington Redskins and Philadelphia Eagles about potential weather-related scheduling contingencies in case Hurricane Joaquin impacts the D.C. area this weekend.
"We are monitoring the forecast and having dialogue with both teams," said Greg Aiello, the NFL’s senior vice president of communications.
Aiello declined to say what prospective scheduling changes are being discussed.
Here's the current projected path for Hurricane Joaquin, via the National Hurricane Center:
More details via The Washington Post:
A serious weather event may unfold over the Washington, D.C., area Friday and into this weekend. Hurricane Joaquin is forecast to come very close to the Mid-Atlantic coast, and possibly move inland. At the very least, a period of heavy rain is likely. In a worst-case scenario, the region could contend with a dangerous, long-duration flooding event, widespread damaging winds and a significant surge of water up the Chesapeake Bay and Potomac River.
It is important to recognize that a worst-case scenario is one of several possibilities, so there’s no need to panic, but simply to begin thinking about hurricane and flooding preparedness and remaining tuned to the forecast, as it is likely to evolve substantially over the next 72 hours.
There is a good deal of uncertainty pertaining to the exact track of Joaquin, which currently possesses maximum sustained winds of 80 mph and is forecast to strengthen. The majority of computer models forecast it to make landfall between the North Carolina Outer Banks and the southern Delmarva peninsula late Saturday or Sunday. But a few models predict it to remain offshore, parallel to the mid-Atlantic coastline.
There's still a lot of time between now and Sunday's game so these models are subject to change, but for now it's definitely something to keep an eye on.