Since you were probably engrossed in turkey and football when it happened, you may have missed some big weather news. Otto did some pretty unusual things.
No. Not that Otto. Hurricane Otto made landfall near San Juan de Nicaragua, Nicaragua at 1 PM EST with 110 mph sustained winds (National Hurricane Center). That gives Otto a few records:
- As a strong cat 2, Otto gets the record for the strongest hurricane anywhere in the Atlantic basin for this time of year (Eric Blake, hurricane specialist at NHC)
- And by far the strongest in that part of the Caribbean at anytime of year (Eric Blake)
- Otto is the latest hurricane on record in the western Caribbean, beating the previous record set by Martha in 1969 (Philip Klotzbach, hurricane specialist at Colorado State University)
- Otto is now the southernmost landfalling hurricane on record for Central America (National Hurricane Center)
- And the latest landfalling hurricane anywhere in the Atlantic basin (Philip Klotzbach).
All of that kept the Hurricane Hunters far from home for the holiday (Rick Knabb, NHC Director). But we aren’t quite done with Otto yet. Otto crossed over Central America and reemerged in the Pacific while maintaining it’s tropical cyclone status.
Microwave imagery tracks #Otto making landfall & traversing #Nicaragua & #CostaRica. pic.twitter.com/HAV482usZ2
— UW-Madison CIMSS (@UWCIMSS) November 25, 2016
Only 5 tropical cyclones have been able to do that since 1950 (Philip Klotzbach). Since Otto maintained itself as a tropical cyclone all the way across the land mass of Central America, based on National Weather Service and World Meteorological Organization protocols put in place several years ago, Otto earned the right to keep it’s name as it moved into the Pacific (National Hurricane Center). Usually there is a different set of names for Atlantic and Pacific tropical cyclones. Otto is still a tropical storm for now, but it is expected to finally dissipate in 4 or 5 days as it continues to pull away from Central America. By the way, the Atlantic hurricane season officially runs from June 1 to November 30, but the 2016 season got off to a very early start with hurricane Alex in January and is obviously still going strong 10 months later.
Otto was responsible for a number of fatalities and widespread damage in Central America. So, while the weather here has been far from ideal, we have one more thing to be thankful for this Thanksgiving…no hurricanes!!
If you are looking for more sunshine this weekend, Sunday is your day. Your Saturday weather in one word…dreary. Skies will be cloudy everywhere all day. Some areas will get some light rain…mainly southeastern MA (the Cape and the Islands) and western MA (the Berkshires). In the middle, just cloudy.
Sunshine finally returns Sunday but a bit of a breeze will make it feel cool. We stay dry on Monday but rain returns Tuesday afternoon and continues off/on through Thursday. It won’t be non-stop rain, but periods of rain for a few days that will really add up. Right now it seems like we could get over 1″ of rain by the time it clears out on Friday.