Hurricane Joan...

[Anonymous]

Gilbert stole the spotlight in the 1988 Hurricane Season, but we can not forget Hurricane Joan. Joan was a 145 mph Category 4 hurricane that slammed into Bluefields, Nicaragua killing 216 people and causing 840 million dollars damage. The pressure at landfall was 932 mb.

Images of Joan are almost non-existent. After searching for days, I found ONE IMAGE OF HURRICANE JOAN. It was RIGHT before landfall at her peak of 145 mph. It was a poor image...but, I replenished it, and here it is:



If anybody else has any other images of Joan, go ahead and post them. Can anybody weigh in with their thoughts on Hurricane Joan, and WHY IMAGES OF HER ARE SO SCARCE?

[Derek Ortt]

one thing that was interesting about Joan... it became a major hurricane for the first time while moving ACROSS that 20,000 foot mountain of northern Columbia, then weakened to a cat 1 after interacting with TD 18, then regained major status near Nicaragua

[Hurricanehink]

Derek, where did you find that information? According to Unisys,
Still impressive though. Wasn't it the strongest hurricane south of 12º?

[Derek Ortt]

have to go to the tropical cyclone report for Hurricane Joan from the NHC

[HurricaneBill]

I found a Joan pic on the internet a few years ago. It has long since vanished, but I had printed it out. You can see it in that "past hurricanes pictures" thread.

I've looked high and low for pics on the internet of the retired storms.

Here are the most elusive (meaning I found photos of none of these)

Satellite wasn't around for the 1950s storms but radar was.

Hurricane Carol 1954
Hurricane Edna 1954
Hurricane Hazel 1954
Hurricane Diane 1955
Hurricane Ione 1955
Hurricane Janet 1955
Hurricane Gracie 1959
Hurricane Hattie 1961
Hurricane Flora 1963
Hurricane Dora 1964
Hurricane Hilda 1964
Hurricane Carmen 1974
Hurricane Fifi 1974
Hurricane Diana 1990
Hurricane Klaus 1990

The earliest radar pic I have in my collection is of Hurricane Alice in 1955. Earliest radar of a retired storm I have is Connie in 1955.

The earliest satellite pic I have is Hurricane Donna in 1960.

[Anonymous]

Can you post the link to the Joan picture?

[Josephine96]

Joan was in 88 hmm

[James]

I believe she also carried on through the E. Pacific as Tropical Storm Miriam.



Am I right in thinking that nowadays she would have retained the name 'Joan'?

[Derek Ortt]

today she would have remained Joan

[James]

Thanks.

[cyclonaut]

Several months ago I searched long & hard for an image of Joan & came up with nothing..Very strange for that was an impressive storm.

[James]

It is strange. Surely there must be more than just one image of such an impressive storm. That's not to say that your efforts are not appreciated Floydbuster, because they most certainly are. Thanks for posting the image.

[HurricaneBill]

It's interesting. Before 1995, the only hurricane photos you'd find would be of significant or destructive storms.

Then after 1995, we have pics of every storm.

Do you think the 1995 season had something to do with increasing the popularity of hurricane photos or do you think it was simply because the Internet was increasing in popularity.

[AJC3]

Assorted image sets of Joan using data taken from the NESDIS SAA site - the top images of each set use the NOAA BD enhancement (the dread Dvorak curve) and the bottom is unenhanced VIS or IR (depending on the time) with false sea color.

Unfortunately there's no geo-reference (map or LALO) available from the 4KM res Global Area Coverage (GAC) images and the 1KM Local Area Coverage (LAC) images didn't quite cover far enough south.














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[James]

Amazing! Thanks for posting them!