Hurricane Melissa Produces Strongest Gust Recorded in a Hurricane

Hurricane Melissa was a devastating category 5 storm that made landfall in Jamaica as one of the strongest systems on record in the Atlantic Basin.

A dropsonde recorded a wind gust of 252 mph shortly before landfall, which was verified this week by NSF NCAR (U.S. National Science Foundation National Center for Atmospheric Research) to be accurate, making it the strongest gust ever recorded in a tropical cyclone.

WeatherNation Meteorologist Rob Bradley discusses the data and Melissa's intense winds with hurricane researcher Andy Hazelton, who was working the data position on the reconnaissance flight that recorded the record gust.

What are meso-vortices? These are smaller scale circulations in the atmosphere that are essentially miniature low pressure systems. These can be observed within clusters of thunderstorms, but they also appear within the eye and eye wall of intense hurricanes. Melissa produced some of the most visually stunning meso-vortices in the satellite era (below).