Hurricane Kyle (2008)

Hurricane Kyle

Category 1 hurricane (SSHWS/NWS)
Hurricane Kyle near peak intensity on September 28
Formed	September 25, 2008
Dissipated	September 30, 2008
(Extratropical after September 29)
Highest winds	1-minute sustained: 85 mph (140 km/h)
Lowest pressure	984 mbar (hPa); 29.06 inHg
Fatalities	8 total
Damage	$57.1 million (2008 USD)
Areas affected	Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, Bermuda, New England, Atlantic Canada, southeastern Quebec
Part of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season

Hurricane Kyle was the eleventh tropical storm and sixth hurricane of the 2008 Atlantic hurricane season. It formed from a strong tropical disturbance that tracked across the northeastern Caribbean Sea in the third week of September. As a low pressure area, it moved slowly across Puerto Rico and Hispaniola, dumping torrential rains across those islands.

By September 24, it began to track northward away from the islands, and developed enough strong thunderstorm activity near its center and a well-defined enough circulation to be deemed a tropical storm on September 25. It strengthened to a hurricane on September 27 west of Bermuda. It made landfall in Nova Scotia as a Category 1 hurricane late on September 28, then became extratropical shortly afterward.

The precursor to Kyle produced torrential rainfall over Puerto Rico, resulting in six fatalities and $48 million in damages. Little impact was recorded in Hispanola and Bermuda as the system tracked northward. Along the eastern United States, rough seas resulted in two fatalities and as the storm made landfall in Canada, heavy rains fell in eastern Maine. In Canada, Kyle had relatively little impact, leaving $9 million in damages and no fatalities.

Hurricane Kyle began as a weak area of low pressure associated with a tropical wave that moved off the west coast of Africa on September 12. The system tracked in a general westward direction with little convective development and tracked over the Leeward Islands on September 18. An upper-level trough situated over the eastern Caribbean Sea interacted with the wave, resulting in an increase in shower and thunderstorm activity. The following day, a larger surface circulation developed as the low moved towards the northwest. The wave later became separated from the low, with the wave continuing towards the west and the low tracking to the northwest. The National Hurricane Center (NHC), at this time, were not anticipating significant development of the low as strong wind shear inhibited deep convection from forming. Around 1400 UTC on September 21, a Tropical Cyclone Formation Alert (TCFA) was issued for the system as convection developed around the center of circulation.