1982 Pacific hurricane season

El Niño and a record count

1982 was the most active and costliest Pacific hurricane season on record at the time. Its count of 23 named storms, 12 hurricanes and 5 major hurricanes matches the site's archive. East of 140°W, 19 named storms formed against a 1966 to 1982 average of 14.4, and 11 reached hurricane strength against an average of 5.5.

A strengthening El Niño warmed the equatorial central Pacific by nearly 5°F above normal. It fueled the five major hurricanes in the eastern Pacific and the crowd of central Pacific storms. Six systems crossed 140°W into the Central Pacific Hurricane Center's area, three times as many as in 1981, and a then-record four named storms formed there: Akoni, Ema, Hana and Iwa. It was the first season in which the center named storms from its Hawaiian lists.

A summer procession toward Hawaii

Tropical Storm Aletta opened the season on 20 May south-southwest of Acapulco and looped offshore before dissipating on 29 May. June and early July brought Bud, Carlotta and several depressions. Hurricane Daniel then formed south of Mexico on 7 July and peaked at 100 kt on 11 July southwest of Manzanillo. It crossed into the central Pacific as a tropical storm and dissipated on 22 July in the Alenuihaha Channel between Maui and the Big Island.

Hurricane Gilma peaked at 110 kt on 29 July well east-southeast of Hawaii, then weakened and passed about 50 miles south of South Point as a depression on 1 August. Hurricane John reached 100 kt on 6 August as it entered the central Pacific and passed about 180 miles south of the Big Island as a depression. Hurricane Kristy weakened, restrengthened to a hurricane on 13 August and passed 250 miles south of South Point the next day. None of the three struck the islands.

Late August and September kept the pace. Hurricane Miriam crossed into the central Pacific on 4 September, and Hurricane Norman peaked at 90 kt in the archive before dissipating west of Baja California on 18 September; its moisture brought scattered rain to California and Arizona. Tropical Storms Ema and Hana formed in the central Pacific on 15 September, and Hurricane Sergio reached 110 kt on 17 October after forming near the Gulf of Tehuantepec.

Hurricane Olivia's rain in the western United States

Olivia formed about 400 miles south-southwest of Acapulco on 18 September, became a hurricane about a day later and intensified fast to its 125 kt peak on 21 September, the strongest of the season. It weakened over cooler water off Baja California and dissipated about 250 miles west-southwest of San Diego on 25 September.

Southwest flow carried Olivia's moisture into the western United States and southwestern Canada. Its remnants, combined with an upper-level system and the terrain, dropped more than 7 inches of rain in parts of California and northern Utah and helped give Salt Lake City a record monthly total of 7.04 inches. The rain wiped out half of California's raisin crop and a quarter of its wine crop, with losses of $325 million in 1982 dollars, mostly agricultural.

Hurricane Paul and the Central American floods

Paul began as a disturbance off Nicaragua on 15 September. The depression moved inland near the El Salvador and Guatemala border around 20 September, fell apart, drifted back over the Pacific and twice regenerated. It became a tropical storm on 25 September and a hurricane two days later. The archive places its 95 kt peak on 29 September, the day it crossed Baja California Sur, and it crossed at peak intensity before a final landfall near Los Mochis. Paul was the only Pacific hurricane to make landfall that year.

The worst toll came from the precursor depression's rain, which killed 761 people in El Salvador, 312 of them in San Salvador, where floodwater reached 8 feet and mud buried hundreds of homes. Guatemala reported 615 deaths and 668 missing, Nicaragua 71 deaths and southern Mexico 225, and published totals give 1,625 fatalities for the storm overall. Economic losses it lists include $280 million in El Salvador, $100 million in Guatemala and $356 million in Nicaragua, in 1982 dollars.

In Mexico, 50,000 people evacuated before landfall in Baja California Sur, where gusts estimated at 120 mph left 9,000 homeless in San José del Cabo without reported deaths. Sinaloa counted 24 deaths and lost up to 40 percent of its soybean crop. Mexican damage came to 4.5 billion pesos, about $70 million in 1982 dollars.

Hurricane Iwa strikes Kauai

Iwa developed from a late-season trough southwest of Hawaii, became a hurricane on 23 November and peaked at 80 kt in the archive. It accelerated northeast and passed just north of Kauai on 24 November, then weakened and became extratropical on 25 November. It was the strongest hurricane on record to cross the Hawaiian Islands up to that time.

Its fast motion pushed surge 900 feet inland. On Kauai, 5,800 people evacuated, 44 of 45 boats at Port Allen sank and 3,890 homes were destroyed or damaged. Oahu reported at least 6,391 damaged homes and 418 destroyed buildings, and Niihau lost 20 homes. One person died directly from the storm, in rough seas at Pearl Harbor, and two more in a traffic accident caused by failed signals, with damage of $312 million in 1982 dollars, the costliest for Hawaii at the time.

The World Meteorological Organization retired Iwa from the central Pacific lists. In the eastern Pacific, 1982 was the first year of six rotating name lists; Fabio replaced Fico, and the set returned in 1988.