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After the tree limbs are chopped up, the debris is swept away and the water subsides, Milton, like Helene, will be a hurricane that people, especially meteorologists, will remember and refer to for years to come.
The storm, which formed only four days before landfall, became one of the most intense hurricanes on record in the Gulf of Mexico, rivaling hurricanes like Wilma and Rita, both from 2005. Milton’s raw power is just one of the things that made it memorable.
Here’s a look at five things that stood out this week.
One key part of the very first forecast was incredibly accurate.
Forecasters at the National Hurricane Center had one key piece of Milton’s puzzle correct at the start. When they issued their first forecast last Saturday, the anticipated path aligned almost precisely with where Milton ended up making landfall in Siesta Key, Fla. Historically, four days before landfall, the average error for a storm’s path is about 150 miles.
Over the next few days, the forecast path would nudge north and south, leaving residents fearful of vastly different potential impacts as the storm wobbled. People in Tampa, especially, grew increasingly worried about a worst-case scenario landfall north of Tampa Bay at high tide, which would have delivered a historically destructive storm surge.
Milton quickly became one of the strongest storms ever.
Forecasters did not have Milton’s intensity right on that first go, and they assumed the storm would be a strong Category 2 at landfall. But they started dialing in on the possibility of a major hurricane, a 3 or higher, a few hours later. And that is exactly what happened: From Sunday to Monday, Milton grew from a tropical storm to one of the strongest storms ever in the Gulf of Mexico.
By 8 p.m. on Monday, its wind speeds had increased to 180 miles per hour. Based on wind speed, it joined a handful of other hurricanes that rivaled the strongest Atlantic storm ever recorded: a 1980 hurricane named Allen, which had a peak wind speed of 190 m.p.h. before it made landfall along the United States-Mexico border.
Another way to measure a storm’s strength is by how low the pressure becomes inside it. As hurricane hunter aircraft moved through Milton’s pinhole eye on Monday evening, they recorded a near-record low pressure of 897 millibars, joining only five other Atlantic hurricanes to dip below 900 millibars: Allen, Rita, the Labor Day storm of 1935, Gilbert in 1988 and Wilma.
More than 100 structures were damaged before Milton came ashore on Wednesday, and local officials said at least five people were dead after a tornado moved through St. Lucie County, on the other side of the state from the Gulf Coast.
Milton became unbalanced just before landfall.
As night approached and Milton tracked closer to shore, it turned practically lopsided, with all the heavy rain on the northern side of the storm. An interaction with cooler and drier air steered the storm to the northeast, into Sarasota, which is why the storm weakened to a Category 3 hurricane at landfall, and spread its wind radius even farther out.
Despite the unbalanced look on weather satellite and radar, the winds were strong on both sides of the eye. To the south, a storm surge raged ashore, while in Tampa Bay, the winds pushed the water out for a brief period, creating a reverse surge. Had it not become unbalanced, the storm might have been able to carry its strength a while longer, and the effects could have been even more destructive.
The storm’s new shape affected who got the most rain.
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