1993 Atlantic hurricane season

A third quiet year in a row

Richard Pasch and colleagues at the National Hurricane Center counted eight tropical storms and four hurricanes in 1993, the third straight year below the 50-year averages of about ten and six. The site's archive agrees: 8 tropical storms, 4 hurricanes and 1 major hurricane, with accumulated cyclone energy of 38.4. No storm reached hurricane strength south of 21°N, and for the fourth year running no hurricane occurred over the Caribbean Sea.

The NHC tied the season's shape to vertical wind shear in August and September, when all but one of the named storms formed. Most storms developed where shear ran near or below normal. Tropical Storm Dennis drifted into stronger shear and died at sea, while Emily idled as a depression in strong shear before reaching calmer air off the southeastern United States. Late in September the upper-level winds over the eastern tropical Atlantic flipped from easterly to westerly, and Harvey lost its tropical character on 21 September, the earliest end to named-storm activity in years.

Despite the low numbers, the NHC tallied 280 deaths from the season's tropical cyclones, most of them in Venezuela during Tropical Storm Bret.

Rain before the storms: May and June

Tropical Depression One formed near the Isle of Youth on 31 May, the day before the official season opened, and crossed western Cuba and the Bahamas. It never reached storm strength, but it dropped 12.4 inches of rain at Topes de Collantes, destroyed 1,860 homes and killed seven people in Cuba, plus 13 in Haiti.

Tropical Storm Arlene grew from a disturbance that the NHC said caused a deadly landslide in El Salvador before it organized. It formed in the Gulf of Mexico on 18 June and came ashore on Padre Island, about 75 km south of Corpus Christi, early on 20 June with a 1001 mb pressure. Arlene's strongest winds sat far east of its center, a sign of subtropical structure. The NHC reported five flood deaths in Mexico, one in Henderson, Texas, $33 million in damage in Campeche and $22 million in Texas, in 1993 dollars. Other counts add 20 deaths from the precursor in El Salvador, for 26 overall.

Bret's deadly track along South America

Tropical Storm Bret formed from an African wave on 4 August and raced west under a strong ridge. It skirted Trinidad early on 7 August, moved along the Venezuelan coast and crossed northern Colombia, where Pico Cristóbal Colón, about 5,800 m high, nearly destroyed its circulation. Bret regenerated over the southwest Caribbean and came ashore in southern Nicaragua on 10 August with winds near 21 m/s, below its archive peak of 50 kt. Its remnants later became eastern Pacific Hurricane Greg.

Heavy rain turned deadly in Venezuela, where 339 mm fell in ten hours at Guanare. The Venezuelan government reported 173 deaths and many missing, most in poor hillside districts around Caracas, and press reports put 10,000 people out of their homes. The NHC listed about $25 million in damage in Venezuela in 1993 dollars, one death in Colombia and ten in Nicaragua, nine of them aboard a Spanish vessel that sank near Isla de Maíz. Other totals give 184 deaths for the storm across its path.

Tropical Storm Cindy became a named storm over Martinique on 14 August and weakened over Hispaniola two days later. The NHC recorded 305 mm of rain at Prêcheur, two flood deaths in Martinique and two in the Dominican Republic, and several million dollars of damage on Martinique.

Hurricane Emily at Cape Hatteras

Emily formed 1,300 km east-northeast of Puerto Rico on 22 August and stalled in weak steering currents, reaching hurricane strength on 26 August. A series of troughs and ridges then pushed it west and northwest toward the Carolinas. Its peak came late on 31 August, as the eye passed about 37 km east of Hatteras Island. The NHC estimated one-minute winds of 51 m/s, about 100 kt, for 12 hours from 1800 UTC and an aircraft-measured pressure of 960 mb, matching the archive's peak.

The center never crossed the coast, but part of the western eyewall swept Hatteras Island, and the NHC counted Emily as a Category 3 landfall for Hyde and Dare counties. Onshore winds from Pamlico Sound pushed a storm surge flood of 3.1 m above sea level into Buxton, while surge on the ocean side reached only 0.3 to 0.6 m. Emily turned east on 2 September and became extratropical far out in the Atlantic on 6 September.

The NHC reported three surf drownings, one in Virginia and two at Nags Head, 553 dwellings left uninhabitable and a preliminary $35 million in North Carolina damage, mainly on Hatteras Island. About 160,000 people evacuated North Carolina's barrier islands and 100,000 left the Maryland coast. A later damage figure reaches $45 million, all in North Carolina, in 1993 dollars. NOAA research aircraft flew two synoptic experiments during the threat, and the NHC credited good guidance for a well-forecast recurvature.

Gert's three landfalls and a short September

Hurricane Gert began off Panama on 14 September and made three landfalls. It crossed Nicaragua and Honduras as a tropical storm and depression, struck Belize at minimal storm strength, then crossed the Yucatán Peninsula into the Bay of Campeche. There it slowed and deepened to 970 mb, and the NHC estimated its peak of about 44 m/s just before the eye came ashore north of Tuxpan near 2100 UTC on 20 September. The archive records 85 kt. Gert's remnant reached the Pacific as a depression.

Gert's broad circulation dumped rain on the Sierra Madre Oriental, with 427 mm in 24 hours at Tanzabaca in San Luis Potosí. The Mexican government reported 42 deaths, 29,075 homes damaged or destroyed and about $156 million in damage in 1993 dollars. Press reports added 21 deaths in Honduras, 8 in Nicaragua, 4 in El Salvador and 1 in Costa Rica, for 76 in the NHC account. Later totals give at least 102 deaths and more than $170 million in damage in 1993 dollars.

Two short-lived hurricanes formed at high latitude. Floyd raced northeast past Bermuda and briefly reached hurricane strength near a Canadian buoy on 9 September before becoming extratropical; its remnant later neared Brittany. Harvey became a hurricane only at 1800 UTC on 20 September and turned extratropical the next day. The last system, a depression that formed southeast of Bermuda on 29 September, merged with a cold front a day later.