Hurricane Camille

Nearly 45 years ago one of the most powerful and damaging weather phenomenon’s ever to be recorded slammed into the shores of the Gulf of Mexico, a storm that effected people far and wide. Camille formed on August 14th just west of the Cayman Islands and rapidly intensified overnight becoming a category 3 hurricane approaching the island of Cuba. The storm trekked north-northwestward across the Gulf and became a stage 5 hurricane and maintained its strength before making landfall on the Mississippi Coast on the eve of August 17th. The devastating aftermath in the weeks to follow induced by the winds, surges, and rainfall took the lives of 256 people, and caused an estimated damage of 1.421 billion dollars.
The development of the storm was initiated by an apparent tropical wave that had given way of the African Coast around August 5th. The cloud pattern of the storm slightly resembled that of an inverted “V” began traveling westward, then northward, across the Atlantic Ocean and was recognized as a tropical disturbance 4 days later, August 9th. The following 5 days or so the storm continued to travel showing no sign of circulation. On August 14th the United States Air Force sent a reconnaissance aircraft into the storm for surveillance, with a growing concern. What was about to be Tropical storm Camille was still south of Cuba with expectation to become much more potent. At the point of infiltration by the aircraft the planes barometer revealed a 999 millibar pressure center with 55 mile an hour surface winds. At this point the disturbance was inaugurated to be a “tropical storm.” As the intensification process ensued, and the squall shifted northwestward at a slow speed of 9 miles per hour, but gained a great amount of force in...

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...al Kentucky, and a unexpected and maybe the most damaging part of the storm to the southernmost portions of Virginia and West Virginia. A terrible combination of interacting factors contributed to absolutely terrible flooding in the hills and mountain valleys of the Appalachians.
Hurricane Camille was an extraordinary show of power by Mother Nature and proved that through the scars it left on the extremely long and unordinary path is took through the Eastern portion of the United States. From the complete destruction where the storm took land to the absolutely unimaginable floods that carried through the hills and valleys of the Virginias, Camille proved to be one of the most unique, interesting, prevailing, and unforgettable hurricanes and weather extravaganzas ever to take place.

Works Cited

http://www.hurricanescience.org/history/storms/1960s/camille/