Hurricane Ethel (1960)
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| Category 5 hurricane (SSHS) | ||
|---|---|---|
| Formed | September 14, 1960 | |
| Dissipated | September 17, 1960 | |
| Highest winds |
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| Lowest pressure | 981 mbar (hPa; 28.98 inHg) | |
| Fatalities | None reported | |
| Damage | $1 million (1960 USD) $7 million (2006 USD) |
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| Areas affected |
Southeast Louisiana, Mississippi Gulf Coast | |
| Part of the 1960 Atlantic hurricane season |
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Hurricane Ethel formed in the Gulf of Mexico on the morning of 14 September 1960, rapidly intensified into a potentially catastrophic Category 5 hurricane, and weakened back to a tropical storm before making landfall near Biloxi, Mississippi the next evening. Because of the rapid weakening, the storm caused little damage and no deaths; however, the validity of the storm's supposed Category 5 status is questionable.
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[edit] Storm history
Soon after Tropical Storm Ethel formed north of the Yucatán Peninsula on the morning of September 14, a Marine Automatic Meteorological Observing System buoy in the central Gulf of Mexico began to record gale-force winds. Ethel developed rapidly into a full-fledged hurricane by midday and into an intense hurricane by dusk.
Reconnaissance aircraft reported a central pressure of 972 mb and winds to 140 kt by evening. Despite a central pressure typical of a category 2 hurricane, the extreme winds justify rating Ethel a Category 5, the highest level on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale. Although this observation appears in the best-track database, several sources dating from the 1960s cast doubt on its validity and list Ethel instead as a "moderate hurricane" that perhaps briefly reached major hurricane (category-3) status.
As the second storm of the 1960 Atlantic hurricane season to reach category five, Hurricane Ethel followed category-five Hurricane Donna. This feat made the season the earliest known with two Category 5 (and the only year when two consecutive storms reached Category 5 intensity). The official record lists a category five hurricane only if somebody measured its winds or pressure with an accurate instrument, lived to tell about it, and recorded the measurement legibly in a medium known to weather historians. Earlier seasons almost certainly had multiple category-five hurricanes; however, records of these intensities do not survive.
At midnight on the morning of September 15, extreme hurricane Ethel churned just 75 miles south-southeast of the mouth of the Mississippi River. Citizens of the Gulf Coast from New Orleans, Louisiana eastward rapidly prepared for the worst. The worst of the hurricane hit Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana in the predawn hours. Venice, Louisiana in the lower Plaquemines, reported 78-kt winds and 90-kt gusts. Easterly winds propelled a seven-foot storm tide into Quarantine Bay on the Breton Sound just north of Venice.
Ethel maintained category-five intensity only briefly; cool, dry air entrained into the circulation of the storm overnight. The hurricane consequently weakened even more dramatically than she had intensified the previous day. Ethel diminished to a minimal hurricane by dawn, skirting just east of the mouth of the Mississippi. This weakening ranks among the most rapid ever recorded over water and sharply contrasts with Hurricane Donna, which spent more time as an intense hurricane than any other on record.
Ethel diminished further into a mere tropical storm and crossed the uninhabited Chandeleur Islands, the Chandeleur Sound, and the Mississippi Sound to make landfall in Biloxi, Mississippi on the afternoon of September 15. Keesler Air Force Base recorded a minimum pressure of 981.4 mb, representative of a minimal hurricane; however, the storm produced no winds of that magnitude.
The center of Ethel moved northward through eastern Mississippi into northwestern Alabama on September 16, weakening into a tropical depression. The depression continued into middle Tennessee until it dissipated in Kentucky on the afternoon of 17 September.
[edit] Impact
Despite reaching Category 5 intensity, Hurricane Ethel caused only minimal damage in the United States and was not justified for retirement. Minor coastal flooding occurred as far eastward as Saint Marks, Florida, and several inches of rain fell in this general area. Because rain storms of this magnitude occur regularly in the Deep South, Ethel caused little flood damage.[citation needed] Hurricane force winds were reported in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, including Venice which reported sustained winds of 90 mph and gusts of up to 104 mph. While moving past Louisiana, the hurricane produced a storm surge of 7 feet in Quarantine Bay.[1]
Throughout its path, Ethel spawned six tornadoes, all of which occurred in Florida and Alabama.[2] An F0 tornado in Clarke, Alabama destroyed a barn, damaged a house, and uprooted a few trees. An F2 tornado in Talladega possibly spawned by Ethel damaged numerous commercial buildings and houses along its 1/4 mile path. The tornado turned several cars over, broke windows, knocked power lines down, and injured two people.[3]
Damages totaled approximately $1 million (1960 USD) (roughly $6 million in 2005, adjusted for inflation). Only three other Category 5 hurricanes were not retired since recycled name lists began in the Atlantic basin in 1954. The 1964 Atlantic hurricane season therefore reused the name "Ethel."
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