1987 Atlantic hurricane season

A sheared season during El Niño

The National Hurricane Center's summary counted seven storms, four that peaked as tropical storms and three hurricanes, including an unnamed storm in the Gulf of Mexico that it upgraded from a depression after a year-end review. The site's archive lists 7 tropical storms, 3 hurricanes and 1 major hurricane, with an accumulated cyclone energy of 34.4. The season ran below average, held back by the 1986 to 1988 El Niño.

The NHC pointed to persistent vertical wind shear over much of the basin. Every storm except Emily ran into strong shear at some stage, and Arlene alone overcame it to reach minimal hurricane strength. Five storms formed from tropical waves south of 20°N, the first year since 1979 to 1981 in which more than half the named storms began that way.

The United States escaped lightly. The two systems that struck its coast, the unnamed tropical storm and Hurricane Floyd, caused about $8 million in damage in 1980 dollars and no deaths. The NHC noted that 1987 was the fourth season since 1976 without a United States hurricane death, and that the damage total was the smallest since 1962.

From a May depression to an eastern Atlantic trio

The archive's first tropical-stage observation comes on 24 May, from a depression east of the Turks and Caicos Islands. The first storm did not form until 9 August, when a low in the northwestern Gulf of Mexico strengthened quickly under an upper anticyclone. It drifted onto the upper Texas coast with little damage there, but its rain of 125 to 225 mm caused severe flooding along the northern Gulf states and about $7.5 million in damage, mostly in Mississippi.

Hurricane Arlene began as a low off Wilmington, North Carolina, drifted into the Bahamas and passed about 90 km north of Bermuda on 13 August as a tropical storm. It then wandered for more than a week before a ridge sent it north, and it reached hurricane strength at 0600 UTC on 22 August, far out in the North Atlantic. Its remnants reached Spain, where they set an August rainfall record, and no Atlantic storm on record had taken longer to become a hurricane after its track began.

Tropical Storms Bret, Cindy and Dennis all grew from African waves in the eastern Atlantic, and none topped 45 kt in the archive. Cindy passed just northwest of the Azores on 10 September, bringing sustained winds of 15 m/s to Flores. Shear stripped Dennis of its convection, and it merged with an extratropical cyclone on 20 September.

Hurricane Emily from St. Vincent to Bermuda

Emily tracked across the Atlantic at a low latitude and became a tropical storm on 20 September, about 1,100 km southeast of the Windward Islands. Its center crossed St. Vincent the next day, damaging the banana crop, and it became the first Caribbean hurricane since 1981. From 1800 UTC on 21 September to 1800 UTC on 22 September its pressure fell 44 mb to 958 mb, a rate the NHC classed as rapid deepening. The archive places Emily's peak of 110 kt at the end of that period, south of the Dominican Republic.

Emily came ashore between Barahona and Baní, in the Dominican Republic, near 0300 UTC on 23 September, with a central pressure of 965 mb and estimated winds of 49 m/s, below its peak. The NHC reported damage of up to $25 million in the Dominican Republic, where three people were officially listed as dead. The storm weakened over Hispaniola's mountains and emerged off northern Haiti as a tropical storm.

Emily regained hurricane strength southwest of Bermuda on 25 September and passed directly over the island at 1145 UTC, with a pressure of 973.6 mb and sustained winds of 39 m/s gusting to 52 m/s at Kindley Field. Hurricane-force winds lasted only two ten-minute periods because Emily was moving about 20 m/s. Initial damage estimates in Bermuda reached $50 million, and 200 homes had major roof damage. After Bermuda, Emily accelerated past 29 m/s, and the NHC ranked it the fastest-moving hurricane of the century.

Floyd and a Jamaican depression

Hurricane Floyd formed off Nicaragua on 9 October, crossed western Cuba and reached hurricane strength on 12 October, holding it for only 12 hours. Its center passed directly over the Florida Keys that day, with the strongest winds south of the center over the Florida Straits and a lowest pressure of 993 mb near Key West. No official station reported hurricane-force winds. The NHC reported no deaths or injuries and damage of nearly $0.5 million.

The last system, Tropical Depression Fourteen, formed in the western Caribbean on 31 October and dropped more than 254 mm of rain on Jamaica, where unofficial reports cited six deaths. It passed west of Key West on 3 November and merged with a low over northern Florida on 4 November, the archive's last tropical-stage observation.