Hurricane Gilbert - Meteorological History

Meteorological History

The origins of Hurricane Gilbert trace back to an easterly tropical wave—an elongated low-pressure area moving from east to west—that exited the northwestern coast of Africa on September 3, 1988. Over the subsequent days, the wave traversed the tropical Atlantic and developed a broad wind circulation extending just north of the equator. The system remained disorganized until September 8, when satellite images showed a defined circulation center approaching the Windward Islands. The following day, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) classified it as the twelfth tropical depression of the annual hurricane season using the Dvorak technique, when it was located about 400 mi (640 km) east of Barbados. The depression proceeded toward the west-northwest, and while moving through the Lesser Antilles near Martinique, it gained enough strength to be designated as Tropical Storm Gilbert.

After becoming a tropical storm, Gilbert underwent a period of significant strengthening. Passing to the south of Hispaniola, it became a hurricane late on September 10 and further strengthened to Category 3 intensity on the Saffir–Simpson scale the next day. At that time, Gilbert was classified as a major hurricane with sustained winds of 125 mph (200 km/h) and a minimum barometric pressure 960 mbar (hPa; 28.35 inHg). On September 12, the hurricane made landfall on the eastern coast of Jamaica at this intensity; its 15 mi (25 km)-wide eye moved from east to west across the entire length of the island.

Gilbert strengthened rapidly after emerging from the coast of Jamaica. As the hurricane brushed the Cayman Islands, a reporting station on Grand Cayman recorded a wind gust of 156 mph (252 km/h) as the storm passed just to the southeast on September 13. Extreme intensification continued until Gilbert reached a minimum pressure of 888 mbar (hPa; 26.22 inHg) with maximum sustained flight-level winds of 185 mph (295 km/h), having intensified by 72 mbar in a space of 24 hours. This pressure was the lowest ever observed in the Western Hemisphere and made Gilbert the most intense Atlantic hurricane on record until it was surpassed by Hurricane Wilma in 2005.

Gilbert made landfall for a second time on the island of Cozumel, and subsequently made landfall on Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula on September 14 as a Category 5 hurricane, making it the first Category 5 to make landfall in the Atlantic basin since Hurricane David hit Hispanola in 1979; the minimum pressure at landfall in Cozumel was estimated to be 900 mbar (26.6 inHg). The storm weakened quickly while crossing land before it emerged into the Gulf of Mexico as a Category 2 hurricane. Gilbert restrengthened rapidly, however, and made landfall for a final time as a Category 3 hurricane near La Pesca, Tamaulipas on September 16, with winds of about 125 mph (201 km/h).

On September 17, Gilbert brushed the inland city of Monterrey, Nuevo León before taking a sharp turn to the north. The storm spawned 29 tornadoes in Texas on September 18 before moving across Oklahoma and being absorbed by a low-pressure system over Missouri on September 19, finally becoming extratropical.