1996 Atlantic hurricane season

Six major hurricanes in a second busy year

The National Hurricane Center's season summary counted 13 tropical storms, 9 of which became hurricanes, and noted that 1995 and 1996 together produced 20 hurricanes, the highest two-year total since reliable records began in the mid-1940s. Six hurricanes reached Category 3 or stronger, three times the normal number and the most since the seven of 1961. The authors added that, allowing for wind overestimates in earlier decades, 1996 may have been the busiest year for major hurricanes since 1950. The site's archive agrees on 13 tropical storms, 9 hurricanes and 6 major hurricanes, with accumulated cyclone energy of 166.2.

Warm water helped. In June and July the eastern tropical Atlantic ran warmer than normal, feeding a long series of African waves that became Cape Verde storms, and from August to October no system reached tropical storm strength where vertical shear was above normal. Neither El Niño nor La Niña was under way. Steering changed from 1995: a trough over the east-central United States and a ridge reaching farther west guided several hurricanes toward the U.S. East Coast, where the year before most had turned out to sea.

Bertha's early run and Cesar's crossing

Tropical Storm Arthur formed near Grand Bahama on 17 June and crossed Cape Lookout, North Carolina, around 0000 UTC on 20 June with little effect. Hurricane Bertha followed in early July. It crossed the northeastern Caribbean on 8 July as a Category 1 hurricane, passing between Antigua and Barbuda and over the British Virgin Islands, and reached its peak of 100 kt and 960 mb north of Puerto Rico on 9 July. The NHC noted no hurricane had been that strong so early in the season since Alma in 1966.

Bertha weakened as it paralleled the Bahamas and the southeastern coast, then strengthened abruptly in the 12 hours before landfall and came ashore between Wrightsville and Topsail beaches on 12 July with winds the NHC estimated at 46 m/s, Category 2. The NHC linked 12 deaths to Bertha and classed 8 as direct, including drownings in rip currents from Florida to New Jersey and deaths on St. Martin and Puerto Rico. It put United States damage at $270 million in 1996 dollars, twice the insured estimate. Bertha damaged almost 2,500 homes on St. Thomas and St. John, ten months after Hurricane Marilyn.

Hurricane Cesar tracked west along the South American coast from 24 July, becoming a storm near Curaçao, and strengthened fast just before landfall near Bluefields, Nicaragua, at 0400 UTC on 28 July with its peak winds of 75 kt. It crossed Central America and became Hurricane Douglas in the eastern Pacific. The NHC reported at least 51 deaths, most from flash floods and mudslides, including 26 in Costa Rica, which lay outside the storm's direct path.

Edouard, Fran and Hortense from Africa

Hurricane Dolly struck the Yucatán near Chetumal as a minimal hurricane, then regained that strength in the Bay of Campeche and came ashore between Tuxpan and Tampico on 23 August. Newspapers reported 14 deaths in Mexico. Its remnants crossed Mexico to the Pacific, so Dolly and Cesar both moved between basins in the same year, only the second time on record that had happened.

Hurricane Edouard formed southeast of the Cape Verde Islands on 19 August, the first of four cyclones spun off African waves in two weeks. It reached its peak of 125 kt on 25 August, the strongest wind of the season, and stayed at Category 3 or above from 24 August until early on 1 September. Aircraft recorded its lowest pressure, 933 to 934 mb, on 30 August during a phase with three concentric eyewalls. Edouard passed about 140 km southeast of Nantucket on 2 September, bringing tropical-storm-force winds and hurricane-force gusts to the island and Cape Cod. The NHC recorded two direct deaths, both in the New Jersey surf.

Tropical Storm Gustav, the third system in the group, never exceeded 40 kt. Hurricane Hortense crossed Guadeloupe on 7 September, then jogged north and put its eye over southwestern Puerto Rico near Guanica on 10 September as a Category 1 hurricane. It passed Punta Cana in the Dominican Republic and the Turks and Caicos before peaking at 120 kt and 935 mb on 13 September, and later crossed Nova Scotia. Its rains did the harm: floods and mudslides killed at least 18 people in Puerto Rico and 3 in the Dominican Republic, and FEMA reported nearly 11,500 homes severely damaged in Puerto Rico and agricultural losses near $127 million in 1996 dollars.

Fran and the Cape Fear coast

Hurricane Fran trailed Edouard across the Atlantic and lost strength twice as Edouard disrupted its inflow. Once Edouard moved away, Fran strengthened while passing northeast of the Bahamas and reached its peak of 105 kt and 946 mb about 465 km off the Florida coast late on 4 September. It turned north and crossed the Cape Fear area around 0030 UTC on 6 September. The NHC estimated landfall winds of 51 m/s, Category 3, with a pressure of 954 mb, below the storm's earlier peak, and hurricane-force winds over much of the coast from Brunswick to Carteret counties.

Storm tide marks inside buildings reached 2.7 to 3.7 m along the North Carolina coast. Fran's rain spread flooding from the Carolinas into Virginia, West Virginia and Pennsylvania, and the Potomac rose into the streets of Old Town Alexandria. The NHC counted 26 direct deaths: 14 in North Carolina, 4 in Virginia and 2 each in Maryland, South Carolina, West Virginia and Pennsylvania. It estimated United States damage at $3.2 billion in 1996 dollars, double the $1.6 billion in insured losses. Broader totals give 37 deaths.

Josephine, Lili and Marco

Hurricane Isidore stayed over the open Atlantic in late September, peaking at 100 kt without reported damage. Tropical Storm Josephine grew in the Gulf from a stalled front and crossed the coast in Taylor County, Florida, early on 8 October as it began to lose tropical character. Its surge reached about 2.8 m above normal tide, and the NHC put damage at $130 million in 1996 dollars, with no direct deaths. Tropical Storm Kyle formed and faded within two days near Honduras.

Hurricane Lili formed east of Nicaragua on 14 October, crossed the Isle of Youth and came ashore in Matanzas Province, Cuba, on 18 October with winds near 44 m/s. It kept that strength across Cuba and reached its peak of 100 kt and 960 mb just east of the Bahamas on 20 October, the sixth major hurricane of the year. La Moza in Cuba recorded more than 660 mm of rain, and a 4.6 m storm tide was estimated on Great Exuma. The NHC cited press reports of five drownings in Honduras, three deaths in Costa Rica and six in Great Britain after Lili became extratropical.

Hurricane Marco closed the season. It formed south of Jamaica on 16 November, reached hurricane strength briefly on 20 November, and meandered in the western Caribbean for about a week without making landfall. Its rains still caused floods and mudslides in Central America and Hispaniola that killed at least eight people.

Retired names and better track forecasts

The World Meteorological Organization retired Cesar, Fran and Hortense in 1997, and Cristobal, Fay and Hanna took their places in 2002. The NHC's 1996 track forecasts ran 13 to 30 percent more accurate than its 1986 to 1995 averages at every forecast period. For Bertha, forecasters posted the North Carolina hurricane watch 65 hours and the warning 47 hours before landfall, far more than the lead times they aimed for, because the storm slowed faster than expected.