1967 Atlantic hurricane season

A late start under a stubborn high

Arnold Sugg and Joseph Pelissier of the National Hurricane Center noted that only seven seasons since 1897 had begun later than 1967, when Arlene formed on 28 August. None of those produced more than seven named storms, so the eight named storms of 1967 set a record for a late-starting season. They called it the late and great hurricane season of 1967.

June had four well-defined tropical depressions, but July brought none and satellite pictures showed almost no disturbances. Through July and August a positive height anomaly persisted over the western Atlantic, matching a westward shift of the Azores-Bermuda high, a setup the authors considered unfavorable for storms. Hurricanes were active on 44 days, about 10 more than the average of the previous 14 years.

The site counts 13 tropical storms and 6 hurricanes, with accumulated cyclone energy of 125.4 in its archive calculation. The five storms beyond the eight names are unnamed systems in the current best track: a June storm that reached North Carolina on 18 June, a new storm the reanalysis added for late June, a 1 to 5 September storm that forecasters had carried as a depression, and two more in late September and mid-October. 1967 was the first season in which the best-track database kept depressions that never became storms, and the site's storm list also carries four of them.

Beulah through the Caribbean and Yucatán

Beulah came off Africa on 28 August and formed near 14°N, 57°W on 5 September. It passed near Martinique on 7 September, where 11.85 inches of rain fell in 18 hours on 8 September. Sugg and Pelissier reported 15 deaths on Martinique and 2 on St. Vincent, with damage of $4.5 million on Martinique and $3 million on St. Lucia. Beulah became a hurricane on 8 September and deepened to 940 mb south of Puerto Rico.

About 200,000 residents evacuated the Barahona Peninsula of the Dominican Republic, struck by Inez a year earlier, and only two deaths were reported there. Between 10 and 13 September, strong upper winds cut off Beulah's outflow and its central pressure rose about 55 mb. It regained hurricane strength in the western Caribbean and struck Cozumel on the night of 16 September; the reanalysis gives that landfall 110 kt and 954 mb, and 40 percent of the island's houses were destroyed. A falling clock tower killed five people at Tizimín.

Beulah at the Rio Grande

Beulah lost little strength crossing Yucatán and deepened over the western Gulf, where aircraft measured 923 mb twice on 19 September, the second-lowest reconnaissance pressure after Hattie in 1961. The archive places its 140 kt peak early on 20 September. It weakened before the eye came ashore between Brownsville and the Rio Grande at daybreak; the reanalysis puts that landfall east of Matamoros at 110 kt and 940 mb, Category 3.

The storm surge cut 31 channels through Padre Island and reached at least 18 feet near 26.4°N. The circulation stalled near Alice, and 10 to 20 inches of rain fell over much of southern Texas, with more than 30 inches in places. The San Antonio River crested at a record 53.4 feet near Goliad. Sugg and Pelissier counted 47 tornadoes at the time, far above Carla's 26; later surveys raised the count to 115.

Beulah killed 15 people in Texas, 5 in tornadoes and 10 in floods, and 19 in Mexico, where floods left 100,000 people homeless. The Weather Bureau estimated United States damage at $200 million, well below early estimates. Along its whole path, later totals give 59 deaths and $235 million in damage, in 1967 dollars.

Chloe, Doria and three hurricanes at once

Beulah, Chloe and Doria were all on the weather map at hurricane strength for parts of five days. On 16 September ESSA 2 photographed all three on one orbit, a first for satellite imagery. Chloe reached 958 mb on 13 September and crossed the North Atlantic, and its only casualties came when the Fiete Schulze sank in the Bay of Biscay on 21 September: three crew drowned and 11 were missing.

Doria grew from a frontal low east of Jacksonville and moved in nearly every direction during its life. It came within a few miles of the Virginia Capes as a hurricane on 16 September, then met cold, dry air and weakened as it turned south across North Carolina. Indian River Inlet, Delaware, recorded gusts to 83 mph and a 6.5 foot tide. Three people died when a small boat sank off Ocean City, New Jersey.

Fern in Mexico and Heidi at sea

Hurricane Fern formed in the Bay of Campeche on 1 October over water that Beulah had cooled two weeks earlier. It weakened before moving inland about 30 miles north of Tampico early on 4 October; the reanalysis gives that landfall at 50 kt. Its rain swelled the Pánuco River again and three people drowned. Tropical Storm Ginger lasted about a day in the eastern Atlantic, and Hurricane Heidi formed northeast of the Lesser Antilles on 19 October and stayed at sea.