Hurricane Erika (2003)

Hurricane Erika

Category 1 hurricane (SSHWS/NWS)
Erika weakening over northeastern Mexico several hours after landfall on August 16
Formed	August 14, 2003
Dissipated	August 17, 2003
Highest winds	1-minute sustained: 75 mph (120 km/h)
Lowest pressure	986 mbar (hPa); 29.12 inHg
Fatalities	2 direct
Damage	$10,000 (2003 USD)
Areas affected	Florida, Mexico, Southern Texas
Part of the 2003 Atlantic hurricane season

Hurricane Erika was a weak hurricane that struck extreme northeastern Mexico near the Texas-Tamaulipas border in mid-August of the 2003 Atlantic hurricane season. Erika was the eighth tropical cyclone, fifth tropical storm, and third hurricane of the season. At first, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) operationally did not designate it as a hurricane because initial data suggested winds of 70 mph (115 km/h) at Erika's peak intensity. It was not until later data was analyzed that the NHC revised it to Category 1 intensity in the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale. The storm developed from a non-tropical area of low pressure that was tracked for five days before developing in the eastern Gulf of Mexico on August 14. Under the influence of a high pressure system, Erika moved quickly westward and strengthened under favorable conditions. It made landfall as a hurricane on northeastern Mexico on August 16 and rapidly dissipated inland.

While Erika's precursor disturbance was moving across Florida, it dropped heavy rainfall. In south Texas, Erika produced moderate winds of 50 to 60 mph (80 to 95 km/h) along with light rain, causing minor and isolated wind damage in the state. In northeastern Mexico, Erika produced moderate amounts of rainfall, resulting in mudslides and flooding. There, two people were killed when their vehicle was swept away by floodwaters.

A weak surface area of low pressure detached from a frontal system on August 8 while 1,150 miles (1,850 km) to the east of Bermuda. It moved southwestward, and on August 9, it generated convection as it passed beneath a cold-core upper-level low. The surface low and the upper-level low turned westward as it revolved around a common center, and by August 11, the surface low developed into a trough while 440 miles (700 km) south of Bermuda. As the system rapidly continued westward, much of the convection remained near the center of the upper-level low, preventing development of a closed surface circulation. On August 13, while located near the northwestern Bahamas, a substantial increase in convection resulted in the upper-level low building downwards to the middle levels of the troposphere, coinciding with the development of an upper level anticyclone.