How Hurricane Patricia Quickly Became a Monster Storm
It will be a whooper
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http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-hurricane-patricia-quickly-became-a-monster-storm/
How Hurricane Patricia Quickly Became a Monster Storm
The ideal combination of high ocean temperature, soaring humidity and slow prevailing winds created the record-breaking beast
October 23, 2015
Courtesy of NOAA
Hurricane Patricia, the strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere, is plowing toward Mexico’s west coast. The Category 5 storm was a modest hurricane just two days ago but has quickly become a monster, seemingly out of nowhere.
As the Mexican government in three states scrambles to evacuate thousands of people, meteorologists are watching nervously to see what the storm will do next. Patricia, they say, is shaping up to be not only the most powerful but the fastest-growing on record. Twenty-four hours ago, the winds were an impressive 130 miles per hour. Now, at 200 miles per hour, the winds are comparable to the strongest tornadoes.
“The wind damage is going to be something extraordinary,” says Jeff Masters, a meteorologist at the Weather Underground. “We’re talking like a high end EF4, low end EF5 tornado that’s 15 miles wide hitting the coast, if it stays at this strength.” (An EF5 tornado is extremely damaging, and tornadoes are rarely more than a mile wide.)............
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