The Year 



By C.R. Edgerton 



Milton Berle was making us laugh. 

 Timmy and Lassie were making us 



cry. 



And Carol. Edna. Hazel. Connie. 

 Diane and lone were destroying our 

 coastline. 



In the 13 months between Aug. 30. 

 1954 and Sept. 19. 1955. these six hurri- 

 canes staick on or near the North Carolina 

 coast, leaving death and destaiction in 

 their wakes. 



Never before or since has such a 

 rapid succession of hurricanes hammered 

 Tar Heel shores. 



Merchants boarded windows, ripped 

 the boards off, and boarded them again 

 and again. Fishermen tied their boats 

 down, loosened them and repeated the 

 process. Tourists wondered if their 

 vacation would be the next to be mined 

 by a storm from the sea. 



Lifelong coastal residents had 

 weathered many storms, but had never 

 seen anything like this. They began to 



wonder just how long this pelting of their 

 property would continue. 



Nearly 40 years later, most of the six 

 hurricanes have long been forgotten. At 

 least one of them — the powerful Hazel 

 — lives on in the memories of thousands 

 of people who witnessed the most severe 

 hurricane ever to punch the breath out of 

 The Old North State. 



There are theories — some credible, 

 some based on pure conjecture. But most 

 scientists will tell you that they aren't sure 

 why such a large number of hurricanes 

 made landfall in such a small area and in 

 such a limited amount of time. 



"Five years ago, I would have told 

 you that this is all random, that hurricanes 

 don't really have a pattern to them," says 

 Joe Pelissier, deputy director of the 

 National Weather Service office at Raleigh- 

 Durham International Airport. 



"But now, with all we know 7 about 

 hurricane data, I might say that hurricanes 

 can be predicted to a certain degree," 

 Pelissier savs, adding that there are 



Aug. 12, 1955 



Sept. 19, 1955 



CAROL 



Aug. 26, 

 1954 



IDNA 



Sept. 10, 

 1954 



The paths of the hurricanes of 1954 - 1955. 



What Hazel left behind... 



hurricane patterns that might be related to 

 other meteorological events. 



He points to the work of William 

 Gray, a professor at Colorado State 

 University. Over the last six years. Gray 

 has developed statistical models based on 

 certain weather-related events — the 

 Pacific El Nino water-warming phenom- 

 enon, the amount of rainfall in Western 

 Africa, biennial east-west winds above the 

 equator and lowering of air pressure along 

 with increased upper-atmospheric winds in 

 the Caribbean Sea. 



All these phenomena affect when and 

 where hurricanes occur and the power 

 they contain, Pelissier says. 



"Some think it's a statistical fluke, but 

 the evidence is convincing," he says. 



A coupling of the data associated with 

 the hurricanes of 1954-55 in North Carolina 

 with the other weather phenomena in 



In the 13 months between Aug. 30, 1954 and Sept. 19, 1955, these six hurricanes struck 



6 SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 1991 



