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Labor Day Hurricane of 1935

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Natural Disasters

   CAPTION: Labor Day Hurricane of 1935

   Category 5 hurricane ( SSHS)
   Relief train wreckage in Islamorada
   Relief train wreckage in Islamorada
     __________________________________________________________________

   Formed August 29, 1935
   Dissipated September 10, 1935
   Highest
   winds
   185 mph (300 km/h) (1-minute sustained)
   Lowest pressure 892  mbar ( hPa)
   Damage $6 million+ (1935 dollars)

   $82 million+ (2005 dollars)
   Fatalities 408 - 600 direct
   Areas
   affected Bahamas, Florida Keys, Florida Panhandle, Alabama, Georgia,
   South Carolina, North Carolina
   Part of the
   1935 Atlantic hurricane season

   The Labor Day Hurricane was a very compact, intense hurricane that
   formed in the North Atlantic during August 1935. It remains the
   strongest hurricane on record to have struck the United States, and was
   for five decades the strongest Atlantic hurricane ever. Currently, it
   ranks third in lowest central pressure, behind Hurricane Wilma (2005)
   and Hurricane Gilbert ( 1988).

   After striking the Bahamas, the hurricane made landfall along the
   Florida Keys on Labor Day, September 2, 1935 with Category 5 winds on
   the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale. The storm devastated a part of the
   Keys, breaking the islands' road and rail connections to mainland
   Florida. More than 400 people were killed.

Storm history

   Storm path
   Enlarge
   Storm path

   The storm was born as a small tropical disturbance, due east of Florida
   in the Bahamas in late August. The disturbance drifted west through the
   islands toward the Gulf Stream, and U.S. weather forecasters became
   aware of a possible tropical storm approaching.

   In the area of Andros Island in the Bahamas, on the edge of the Gulf
   Stream, the disturbance began to strengthen. It intensified without
   pause for a day and a half, while its track made a gentle turn to the
   northwest, toward Islamorada in the Upper Keys. On Labor Day Monday,
   September 2, it turned to the right. The storm was at its full
   intensity. It struck around 8 p.m. (units unknown).
   Most intense Atlantic hurricanes
   Intensity is measured solely by central pressure
   Rank Hurricane   Season Min. pressure
   1    Wilma       2005         882 mbar ( hPa)
   2    Gilbert     1988         888 mbar (hPa)
   3    "Labor Day" 1935         892 mbar (hPa)
   4    Rita        2005         895 mbar (hPa)
   5    Allen       1980         899 mbar (hPa)
   6    Katrina     2005         902 mbar (hPa)
   7    Camille     1969         905 mbar (hPa)
        Mitch       1998         905 mbar (hPa)
   9    Ivan        2004         910 mbar (hPa)
   10   Janet       1955         914 mbar (hPa)
   Source: U.S. Department of Commerce

   The maximum sustained wind speed at landfall was originally thought to
   have been 160 mph. However, recent reanalysis studies conducted by the
   NOAA Hurricane Research Division (HRD) concluded that the maximum
   sustained winds were more likely around 185 mph at landfall . The
   central pressure (a standard of comparison for hurricane intensity) was
   reliably reported as 26.35 inHg (892 hPa). This was the record low
   pressure for a hurricane anywhere in the Western Hemisphere until
   surpassed by Hurricane Gilbert in 1988 and Hurricane Wilma in 2005. An
   unconfirmed report gave the minimum central pressure as low as 26.00
   inches of mercury (880 hPa) (Storm of the Century - Willie Drye).

   After striking the Keys, the hurricane continued up the west coast of
   Florida and landed again on the Florida Panhandle as a Category 2
   hurricane on September 4. It then passed over Georgia, South Carolina,
   North Carolina and emerged back into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast
   of Virginia. The storm then continued until it became extratropical
   south of Greenland on September 10.

Records

   The Labor Day Hurricane is the strongest hurricane known to have struck
   the United States, and one of the strongest recorded landfalls
   worldwide. It is the only storm known to make U.S. landfall with a
   minimum central pressure below 900 hPa; only two others have struck the
   U.S. with Category 5 strength (with winds over 155 mph). It remains the
   third-strongest Atlantic hurricane on record, behind storms that
   weakened before making landfall.

Impact

   The main transportation route linking the Florida Keys to mainland
   Florida was a single railroad line, the Florida Overseas Railroad
   portion of the Florida East Coast Railway. A 10-car evacuation train,
   sent down from Homestead, was washed off the track by the storm surge
   and high winds on Upper Matecumbe Key. The train was supposed to rescue
   a group of World War I veterans, who, as part of a government relief
   program, were building a new road bridge in the Upper Keys. The
   engineer chose to back the train down the single track line, in hopes
   of saving time on the outward trip, and was unable to reach the waiting
   veterans before the storm did. Only the locomotive remained upright on
   the rails, and had to be barged back to Miami several months later.
   Most intense landfalling U.S. hurricanes
   Intensity is measured solely by central pressure
   Rank Hurricane      Season Landfall pressure
   1    "Labor Day"    1935        892 mbar ( hPa)
   2    Camille        1969        909 mbar (hPa)
   3    Katrina        2005        920 mbar (hPa)
   4    Andrew         1992        922 mbar (hPa)
   5    "Indianola"    1886        925 mbar (hPa)
   6    "Florida Keys" 1919        927 mbar (hPa)
   7    "Okeechobee"   1928        929 mbar (hPa)
   8    Donna          1960        930 mbar (hPa)
   9    " New Orleans" 1915        931 mbar (hPa)
   10   Carla          1961        931 mbar (hPa)
   Source: U.S. National Hurricane Centre

   In total, at least 423 people (164 residents and 259 veterans employed
   on the road project)^(1) were killed by the hurricane. (The official
   National Hurricane Service estimate remains 408 deaths) Bodies were
   recovered as far away as Flamingo and Cape Sable on the southwest tip
   of the Florida mainland. In a fortuitous coincidence, about 350 of the
   718 veterans living in the Keys work camps were in Miami to attend a
   Labor Day baseball game when the storm hit.^(2) If not for this outing,
   many more of the men, whose barracks in the Keys were flimsy shacks,
   might have been killed by the storm.

   The supervisor of the veterans camps, Ray Sheldon, and director of all
   Florida work camps, Fred Ghent, have been criticized for their failure
   to ensure the safety of the veterans as the storm approached. They read
   the Weather Bureau predictions, which had the storm passing south of
   the Florida Keys through the Straits of Florida, as a literal and
   definite forecast of the storm's path. They failed to account for the
   unpredictability of hurricanes, especially considering the primitive
   nature of climatology in 1935. The federal government had an
   arrangement with the Florida East Coast Railway to provide a train to
   evacuate the men. However, due to miscommunication between the
   government and the railway, government officials believed that a train
   could be readied and sent to the Keys from mainland Florida more
   quickly than was the case. An official investigation conducted by
   Aubrey W. WIlliams, Harry Hopkins's top assistant, cleared those
   responsible for the camps of wrongdoing, categorizing the tragedy as an
   unfortunate act of God.^(3) However, Ernest Hemingway, who toured the
   Matecumbes on his fishing boat two days after the storm, harshly blamed
   the government for the men's death in the September 17, 1935 issue of
   New Masses magazine, in an article entitled, "Who Murdered the Vets? A
   First-Hand Report on the Florida Hurricane". Hemingway wrote, "You're
   dead now brother, but who left you there in the hurricane months on the
   Keys where a thousand men died before you when they were building the
   road that's washed out now? Who left you there? And what's the
   punishment for manslaughter now?"^(4)

   The hurricane left a path of near-complete destruction in the Upper
   Keys centered on what is today the village of Islamorada. Nearly every
   structure was demolished; bridges and railway embankments were washed
   away. The links—rail, road, and ferry boats—that chained the islands
   together were broken.
   Florida East Coast Railway rescue train wrecked in Labor Day Hurricane
   of 1935 at Islamorada
   Enlarge
   Florida East Coast Railway rescue train wrecked in Labor Day Hurricane
   of 1935 at Islamorada

   The Islamorada area had been devastated, though the hurricane's
   destructive path was narrower than that of many tropical cyclones. Its
   eye was eight miles across, and the fiercest winds extended only 15
   miles right of the centre, less than 1992's Hurricane Andrew, which was
   also a relatively small and catastrophic Category 5 hurricane. Many
   parts of the Keys, a chain of islands more than 125 miles long from
   south of Miami to Key West, were practically untouched. There was no
   damage in Key West, or in most of the lower and far upper Keys.

   Craig Key, Long Key, Upper Matecumbe and Lower Matecumbe keys (from
   approximately mile 60 to 80 on today's highway mileposts) suffered the
   worst. In this area, hundreds of bodies were caught in wreckage and
   mangrove thickets along the shore. By the third day after the storm,
   corpses had swelled and split open in the subtropical heat, according
   to rescue workers. Public health officials ordered plain wood coffins
   holding the dead to be stacked and burned in several locations.

   The United States Coast Guard and other state and federal agencies
   organized evacuation and relief efforts. Boats and airplanes carried
   injured survivors to Miami. The railroad would never be rebuilt, but
   temporary bridges and ferry landings were under construction as soon as
   materials arrived, and within a few years a roadway (now called the
   Overseas Highway), for the first time, linked the entire Keys chain to
   mainland Florida.

   The storm caused wind and flood damage at its mainland landfall along
   the Florida panhandle, and into Georgia.

Personal observations

   In the Florida Keys, the effects of the intense storm were reported by
   a number of survivors. One was J.E. Duane, caretaker of the Long Key
   Fishing Camp and a cooperative observer for the U.S. Weather Bureau.
   Duane recorded barometric readings and conditions during the passage of
   the storm, near where the exact centre crossed the Keys on September 2.

   At 6:45 p.m., he wrote, the barometer was 27.90 inches and the wind was
   backing to the northwest. "A beam 6 by 8 inches, about 18 feet long,
   was blown from north side of camp, about 300 yards, through observer's
   house, wrecking it and nearly striking 3 persons. Water 3 feet deep
   from top of railroad grade, or about 16 feet."

   After the caretaker's house was destroyed, Duane and about 20 others at
   the camp took refuge in the main lodge building, and then in a cottage
   as structures failed in the intense winds and battering waves. At 9:20
   p.m., Duane reported that the wind abated as the centre of the storm
   passed over the island.

          During this lull the sky is clear to northward, stars shining
          brightly and a very light breeze continued; no flat calm. About
          the middle of the lull, which lasted a timed 55 minutes, the sea
          began to lift up, it seemed, and rise very fast; this from ocean
          side of camp. I put my flashlight out on sea and could see walls
          of water which seemed many feet high. I had to race fast to
          regain entrance of cottage, but water caught me waist deep,
          although writer was only about 60 feet from doorway of cottage.
          Water lifted cottage from its foundations, and it floated.

   After the eye passage, the winds resumed even stronger than before.
   Duane was blown out of the cottage and into the flood waters. "...got
   hung up in broken fronds of coconut tree and hung on for dear life. I
   was then struck by some object and knocked unconscious." He awoke the
   next afternoon and found himself "lodged about 20 feet above ground" in
   the tree.

Aftermath

Cultural impact

   In the Bogart- Bacall hurricane film Key Largo the character played by
   Lionel Barrymore describes his experiences in the great 1935 hurricane.

Memorial

   The 1935 Hurricane memorial on Upper Matecumbe Key, Florida.
   Enlarge
   The 1935 Hurricane memorial on Upper Matecumbe Key, Florida.

   Standing just east of U.S. Route 1 at mile marker 82 in Islamorada,
   near where Islamorada's post office had been, is a simple monument
   designed by the Florida Division of the Federal Art Project and
   constructed using Keys limestone by the Works Progress Administration.
   Unveiled in 1937 with more than 4,000 people in attendance, a frieze
   depicts palm trees amid curling waves, fronds bent in the wind. In
   front of the sculpture, a ceramic- tile mural of the Keys covers a
   stone crypt, which holds victims' ashes from the makeshift funeral
   pyres. The memorial was added to the U.S. National Register of Historic
   Places on March 16, 1995.

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   with only minor checks and changes (see www.wikipedia.org for details
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