Meteorologists who do who have spent the last few days monitoring the rapid development of Hurricane Melissa in the Atlantic Ocean are raising the alarm about the storm, which is expected to hit Jamaica today as a Category 5 hurricane. Experts say the storm’s sustained and increasing intensity is unusual and has the characteristics of a historic hurricane.
“When I look at the cloud pattern, I can tell you as a meteorologist and as a professional and as a human being, it’s beautiful, but it’s also terrifying,” says Sean Sublette, a meteorologist based in Virginia. “I know what’s under those clouds.”
There are several ways to measure the strength of hurricanes. One of them is air pressure: the lower the pressure, the stronger the storm. Early Tuesday morning, as it approached Jamaica, Melissa measured a minimum pressure of 901 millibars (mb) – lower than the pressure of Hurricane Katrina peak low pressure amounting to 902 mb and the lowest pressure ever recorded during a hurricane at the end of the year, According to to Colorado State University meteorologist Philip Klotzbach.
Unbelievably, Melissa’s pain continued to escalate on Tuesday morning. The National Weather Service issued an advisory at noon EDT update measuring the storm pressure at 892 mb. If it makes landfall at this pressure, the effects will be catastrophic The 1935 Labor Day Hurricanewhich hit Florida as the most intense hurricane under pressure to make landfall.
“This record has stood for 90 years,” says Brian McNoldy, senior research fellow at the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine, Atmospheric and Earth Science. “If this went down, it would be a really big deal.”
The drop in pressure as the hurricane approaches land – especially at high ground – is “truly remarkable,” McNoldy says. “Normally it would start to look like a mountainous island like Jamaica, but it would disturb it a little bit and start to weaken it. But right now it’s still intensifying.”
The second way to measure hurricanes is wind speed; Melisa also surprised meteorologists with its strength and the speed with which it intensified. On Saturday, as the storm formed in the Atlantic basin, wind speeds in Melissa reached just 70 mph, lower than the 74 mph in mildest category 1 storms. However, just 24 hours later, they managed to do it jumped to 140 miles per hour—Category 4 strength. Melissa’s winds increased throughout Monday and Tuesday. As of 10:00 a.m. on Tuesday, the maximum wind speed was 300 km/h.
“It’s extremely rare for a storm to rapidly intensify when it’s already really intense,” McNoldy says. “You usually see rapid intensification when it’s a tropical storm or a Category 1, 2 hurricane. Then it happens very often. But not when it’s already at the high end of the intensity.”