Hurricane David

Hurricane David

Category 5 major hurricane (SSHWS/NWS)
David as a 175 mph Category 5 hurricane
Formed	August 25, 1979
Dissipated	September 8, 1979
(Extratropical after September 6, 1979)
Highest winds	1-minute sustained: 175 mph (280 km/h)
Lowest pressure	924 mbar (hPa); 27.29 inHg
Fatalities	2,068+ direct
Damage	$1.54 billion (1979 USD)
Areas affected	Lesser Antilles, Puerto Rico, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Cuba, The Bahamas, Florida, Georgia, East Coast of the United States, Atlantic Canada
Part of the 1979 Atlantic hurricane season

Hurricane David was a Cape Verde-type hurricane that reached Category 5 hurricane status on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale. The fourth named tropical cyclone, second hurricane, and first major hurricane of the 1979 Atlantic hurricane season, traversed through the Leeward Islands, Greater Antilles, and East Coast of the United States during late August and early September. David was the first hurricane to affect the Lesser Antilles since Hurricane Inez in 1966. With winds of 175 mph (280 km/h), David remains the only storm of Category 5 intensity to make landfall on the Dominican Republic in the 20th century and the deadliest since the 1930 Dominican Republic Hurricane, killing over 2,000 people in its path. Also, the hurricane was the strongest to hit Dominica in the 20th century, and was the deadliest Dominican tropical cyclone since a hurricane killed over 200 in September of the 1834 season.

On August 25, the US National Hurricane Center reported that a tropical depression had developed within an area of disturbed weather, that was located about 1,400 km (870 mi) to the southeast of the Cape Verde Islands. During that day the depression gradually developed further as it moved westwards, under the influence of the subtropical ridge of high pressure that was located to the north of the system before during the next day the NHC reported that the system had become a tropical storm and named it David. David continued to strengthen, becoming a hurricane on August 27. As it moved west-northwestward on from August 27–28, it rapidly intensified to a 150 mph (240 km/h) major hurricane. It weakened slightly to a 140 mph (225 km/h) hurricane, but restrengthened by the time David ravaged the tiny windward Island of Dominica on the 29th.