ORLANDO, Fla. -- The National Hurricane Center's latest projected path of movement for Tropical Storm Fay jogged the system east, making landfall south of Tampa as a category 1 hurricane before moving into Central Florida.

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IMAGES: Projected Paths Of Movement

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The current path puts the storm in Key West Monday night as a possible weak category 1 hurricane, near Fort Myers on Tuesday and then into Tampa.

Fay could bring tropical storm-force winds into parts of Central Florida by Tuesday.

"Regardless of its strength (when it hits Central Florida) it has the possibility of producing severe weather in the right front quadrant, which is where we will be," Local 6 meteorologist Eric Wilson said.

Some of the models have the storm moving into Florida around Fort Myers and producing heavy rain in Orlando and surrounding areas.

"It is still very much (Central Florida's) problem," Local 6 meteorologist Tom Sorrells said. "We are going to be dealing with it as early as overnight Monday and throughout the day Tuesday. I really think this storm system is going to do a slow crawl all the way up the coast, and we are going to be dealing with it for days."

The VIPIR model brings the storm into the Tampa Bay area possibly Tuesday night.

"It crawls through Central Florida (on that path)," Sorrells said. "That is not a good solution for anyone, especially for the folks in Tampa and it puts us in the nasty side of the storm."

The system is expected to strengthen into a hurricane late Monday or early Tuesday as it moves north on the coast of Florida.

The cone of project movement still covers much of the state of Florida.

Fay will remain over Cuba most of Monday.

"Where Fay emerges (from Cuba) and where it is going will tell the difference whether we really get thumped with this thing or just get a huge glancing blow," Sorrells said.

Tropical storm-force winds would cover Central Florida on the current path.

"(The storm) takes a long time to get out of here," Sorrells said. "So that mean we are going to be dealing with it Monday night and then really on Tuesday and into Wednesday."

"We are in what is called the ugly side of this," Wilson said. "We need this to move farther out into the Gulf of Mexico or at a bit east."

Winds were expected to remain about 50 mph Sunday as the system moved near Cuba.

Fay continued to head toward the west at about 15 mph with sustained winds at 50 mph.

Watch Local 6 News for more on this developing story.