BUT FIRST

but fi rst...

What’s in a name?

GUESSING THE TRAJECTORY OF A STORM during the annual Atlantic hurricane season isn’t easy, but the meteorological task isn’t anything new – and neither are the names of the storms bantered about on national news from June through November. For hundreds of years most people only bothered naming cyclones that were particularly destructive, and they often bore a moniker related to their geographic location or a certain time period. That began to change around World War II when United States Navy and Air Force meteorologists started an informal convention of naming hurricanes after their wives or other female love interests. By 1953 both the National Weather Service and the World Meteorological Organization formally adopted the gendered naming convention as well, and that labeling system stuck until 1979 when male names were added to the lineup. Today, the National Hurricane Center uses six consecutive lists that are repeated every six years – with individual names only being retired if a storm causes excessive damage (think Hurricane Katrina in 2005 or Sandy in 2012). Though it’s only happened twice in the NHC’s history, the Greek alphabet is also used as backup in the event that a prescribed list is exhausted during a single season – as evidenced by the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season, which famously reported the most named storms in recorded history.

GONE BUT NOT FORGOTTEN

A few of the notable hurricanes that have impacted the Outer Banks since 1985

Gloria

1985 Max Wind: 144 mph Landfall: Hatteras Category 2 at landfall with a 6–8 ft storm surge and 104 mph winds

Kate

1985 Max Wind: 123 mph Landfall: Florida Tropical storm when arrived in NC with 52 mph winds

Bob

1991 Max Wind: 115 mph Landfall: Rhode Island Reached category 3 off of NC coast

Emily

1993 Max Wind: 115 mph Never made landfall Reached category 3 off of coast, estimated $12 million in damages

Bertha

1996 Max Wind: 115 mph Landfall: Topsail Beach Category 2 at landfall with 104 mph winds and a 5-ft storm surge

Fran

1996 Max wind: 121 mph Landfall: Cape Fear Category 3 at landfall with 115 mph winds and an 8-12 ft storm surge

Bonnie

1998 Max Wind: 115 mph Landfall: Cape Fear Category 3 at landfall 6-8 ft storm surge

Earl

1998 Max Wind: 98 mph Landfall: Florida Tropical storm when reached NC

Dennis

1999 Max Wind: 104 mph Landfall: Dare County Tropical storm at landfall 69 mph winds, estimated $10 million in damages

The thrill of the hunt

FOR MORE THAN 70 YEARS, researchers haven’t just tracked the formation of tropical cyclones at sea – they’ve fl own straight into them. Known more commonly as Hurricane Hunters, the two organizations responsible for these manned fl ights are the United States Air Force Reserve’s 53rd Weather Reconnaissance Squadron in Biloxi, Mississippi, and pilots based at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Aircraft Operations Center in Florida. But even as these missions have become impressively sophisticated over the years, the very fi rst manned fl ight into the eye of a hurricane was actually done on a dare. In July of 1943, Colonel Joseph Duckworth fl ew a trainer aircraft directly through a hurricane churning off the Texas coast in order to prove that it could be done – an impromptu experiment that paved the way for decades worth of invaluable meteorological data gathering.

Floyd

1999 Max Wind: 155 mph Landfall: Topsail Island Category 2 at landfall with 109 mph winds

Isabel

2003 Max Wind: 160 mph Landfall: Drum Inlet Category 2 at landfall, 6–10 ft storm surge, created breech in island between Frisco and Hatteras Village, estimated $400 million in damages

Alex

2004 Max Wind: 120 mph Western portion of the category 2 eyewall passed over the Outer Banks Caused fl ooding damage to cars and homes, estimated $2.4 million in damages

Ophelia

2005 Max Wind: 85 mph Landfall: Nova Scotia Passed NC coast as a tropical storm

Earl

2010 Max Wind: 145 mph Landfall: Nova Scotia Passed 100 miles off of the NC coast, estimated $500,000 in damages

Irene

2011 Max Wind: 120 mph Landfall: Just south of the Outer Banks Signifi cant fl ooding, estimated $54 million in damages

Sandy

2012 Max Wind: 70 mph Landfall: Cuba & New Jersey Signifi cant road damage to NC 12, estimated $13 million in damages

Arthur

2014 Max Wind: 101 mph Landfall: between Cape Lookout and Beaufort Category 2 at landfall

Hermine

2016 Max Wind: 73 mph Landfall: Florida Category 1 with tropical sustained winds, estimated $5.4 million in damages

Matthew

2016 Max Wind: 94 mph Landfall: South Carolina Category 1 at Outer Banks, estimated $1.5 billion in statewide damages

Maria

2017 Max Wind: 75 mph Landfall: Puerto Rico Category 1 as it passed off shore NC

Florence

2018 Max Wind: 150 mph Landfall: Wrightsville Beach Category 1 at landfall, estimated $17+ billion in statewide damages

Michael

2018 Max Wind: 160 mph Landfall: Florida Tropical storm that moved over inland NC

Dorian

2019 Max Wind: 185 mph Landfall: Hatteras Category 1 at landfall with 101 mph winds, 4-7 feet of storm surge, $14.8 million in damages

Isaias

2020 Max Wind: 85 mph Landfall: Ocean Isle Beach Category 1 at landfall