E-mail A Friend Tell a friend about the information found on this page by sending them an e-mail.   Your Name: Your E-mail:   Type an e-mail address, then click add: Add a Personal Message: (Optional)

December 2008 issue	In this issue Table of Contents Feature: The year of getting closer Feature: Hungry as a bear Feature: Plight of the bumblebee Feature: The messenger The Inside Story Editor’s Notebook Reverberations À la carte

Click to enlarge

Blow by blow
A steady procession of hurricanes in late summer made the 2008 season one of the worst on record
By Steven Fick and Elizabeth Shilts

One by one, the quartet of Gustav, Hanna, Ike and Josephine — in alphabetical order and alternating women’s and men’s names — pirouetted across the Atlantic Ocean during the 2008 hurricane season. By the time this satellite image (above) was captured by NASA on Sept. 3, Gustav had morphed into a tropical depression and was hovering over Arkansas, its approach having triggered the precautionary evacuation of the city of New Orleans five days earlier. Hanna had lost power, and Josephine was a weak tropical storm. But Ike was gaining power. Sitting in its path was Haiti, the poorest country in the western hemisphere, which had already been slammed by tropical storms Fay, Gustav and Hanna. More than a hundred people died, and thousands were displaced from their homes as mud and water gushed down the deforested mountains surrounding Gonaïves. These images (below) show the city on Sept. 12 compared with a drier period in 2001.

Hurricane season typically runs from June to November. Most seasons since 1995 have averaged around six hurricanes by Sept. 2 but by that date this year, there had already been 10. After Josephine petered out, Kyle swirled onstage in late September, spinning toward the Canadian Maritimes. It brought high winds and rain but spared the area of significant damage.

August 8, 2001 - Click to enlarge

September 12, 2008 - Click to enlarge

top