How rapid intensification spawned two monster hurricanes in one week
Warm waters supercharged hurricane Helene in the Gulf of Mexico and hurricane John in the eastern Pacific
One of the widest hurricanes on record slammed into Florida’s Gulf Coast on September 26 as a powerful Category 4 storm, inundating Florida’s coast with meters-high storm surge and sending tropical storm–force winds as far as 500 kilometers from its eye.
Helene — like so many hurricanes in recent years — seemed to spin up out of nowhere.
Just three days earlier, it was a disorganized cluster of thunderstorms off the eastern coast of Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. A mere “tropical disturbance,” it was dubbed PTC9 for tracking purposes. But on September 24, the U.S. National Hurricane Center released a startling forecast for PTC9.