2014 Pacific hurricane season

A season well above normal

Forecasters expected a near-normal or busier year. In May, the Climate Prediction Center called for 14 to 20 named storms, citing expected below-average wind shear and above-average sea surface temperatures linked to developing El Niño conditions. Mexico's weather service raised its own outlook to 17 named storms by the end of July. The season outran most of those numbers.

Measured by accumulated cyclone energy, the eastern Pacific total was 43 percent above the 1981 to 2010 average and the seventh highest since 1971, according to National Hurricane Center figures. The site's archive gives an ACE of 223.8 for the season as a whole. Unusually, several storms tracked far to the west, and three crossed into the central Pacific, where two more storms formed on their own.

How the season unfolded

The year started fast. Hurricane Amanda became a tropical storm in late May and peaked at 135 knots on May 25, giving the eastern Pacific its highest May ACE on record. Hurricane Cristina followed in June, peaking at 130 knots on June 12 and becoming the earliest second major hurricane on record at the time. By mid-June, seasonal ACE was higher than in any year since 1971 at that point in the calendar.

A quieter spell followed. Tropical Storms Douglas, Elida and Fausto were short-lived and weak, and Tropical Storm Wali formed in the central Pacific in mid-July. By the end of July, ACE had slipped back to near-average levels. Then three systems formed in the last ten days of the month, among them Hurricane Genevieve, Hurricane Hernan and Hurricane Iselle.

August was the busiest month. Hurricanes Julio, Karina, Lowell and Marie all formed, while Genevieve and Iselle became major hurricanes. On August 6, Genevieve, Iselle and Julio lined up across the Pacific together. Karina meandered through a slow loop as Lowell formed to its east, and Lowell grew into an unusually large circulation before weakening over cooler water.

September brought four more hurricanes: Norbert, Odile, Polo and Rachel, along with an unnamed tropical depression that Odile's circulation sheared apart. In October, Hurricane Simon intensified rapidly, Hurricane Ana formed in the central Pacific, and Tropical Storm Trudy struck southern Mexico. Hurricane Vance closed the season, and the last tropical-stage observation came on November 5.

The strongest storms

Two storms reached Category 5 in the archive. Hurricane Marie rapidly intensified south of Mexico and peaked at 140 knots with a central pressure of 918 hPa on August 24. Hurricane Genevieve matched those figures on August 7, but only after a long struggle: it weakened to a remnant low twice before rapidly strengthening south of Hawaii and crossing the International Date Line, where it became a super typhoon.

Hurricane Odile also fell to 918 hPa, on September 14, with peak winds of 120 knots. Six other storms reached major hurricane strength: Amanda, Cristina, Iselle at 120 knots, Simon at 115 knots and Norbert at 110 knots, with Julio just above the threshold at 105 knots. Several peaks came during bursts of rapid intensification, including Simon's jump from Category 1 to Category 4 strength in about 30 hours.

Landfalls and impacts

Hurricane Odile was the season's most destructive storm. It made landfall just east of Cabo San Lucas at 04:45 UTC on September 15 with winds of 110 knots, tying Hurricane Olivia of 1967 as the strongest tropical cyclone on record to affect the Baja California peninsula. The hurricane hit power, water and communications across Baja California Sur, leaving more than 239,000 people without electricity and badly damaging the Cabo San Lucas airport.

The National Hurricane Center attributed 11 direct deaths and one indirect death to Odile, plus two deaths in Texas and New Mexico linked to flooding from its remnants. Mexico's insurance association put preliminary insured losses at about 12 billion pesos, or roughly US$1 billion in 2014.

Hurricane Iselle weakened to a tropical storm before making landfall on the Kau coast of the Island of Hawaii on August 8, with winds estimated at 50 knots. It was the first tropical cyclone landfall in the state since 1992. Falling albizia trees cut power to more than 33,000 customers on the island, and one hiker drowned in a flooded stream on Kauai. Total losses in Hawaii were estimated at US$148 million to US$325 million at the time.

Other storms did damage without a direct hit. Swells from Hurricane Marie caused four direct deaths and close to US$20 million in 2014 damage in the United States, much of it around the Port of Long Beach. Norbert's rains caused three deaths in Baja California, and swells from Hurricane Polo caused two deaths and about 100 million pesos (US$7.6 million) in damage in Guerrero. Tropical Storm Trudy came ashore near Marquelia on October 18, and its flooding caused seven direct deaths in southern Mexico, at least six of them in Guerrero.

Hawaii felt the season more than once. Moisture from the remnants of Wali fed heavy July rain on Oahu, and a swimmer died in rough seas near Molokini. In October, Hurricane Ana passed south of the islands with heavy rain but no recorded casualties. Early in the season, the disturbance that preceded Tropical Storm Boris triggered a landslide that killed five people in Guatemala.

Records and how the counts compare

Hurricane Amanda is the strongest eastern North Pacific hurricane on record for May in the satellite era. The season's eight major hurricanes east of 140 degrees west tied the 1992 record, and its 16 hurricanes tied the highest total then on record. Hurricane Ana became the longest-lived tropical cyclone to stay entirely within the central Pacific. The name Odile was later retired.

The site's counts of 22 tropical storms, 16 hurricanes and 9 major hurricanes match the season totals in the Wikipedia article, but other figures differ by definition. Wikipedia names Marie the strongest storm and counts one Category 5 hurricane, because Genevieve peaked after crossing the Date Line. The site uses each storm's full merged track, so Genevieve's western Pacific peak also counts. For the same reason, the site's ACE of 223.8 is higher than the 202.4 units Colorado State University calculated from National Hurricane Center data for the eastern and central Pacific.