Hurricane Gloria

Hurricane Gloria was a powerful Cape Verde-type hurricane that formed during the 1985 Atlantic hurricane season and prowled the Atlantic Ocean from September 16 to September 28. Gloria reached Category 4 status on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale near the Bahamas, but weakened significantly by the time it made landfall on North Carolina's Outer Banks. Gloria closely followed the Mid-Atlantic coastline and made a second landfall on Long Island, and, after crossing the Long Island Sound, it made a third landfall in Connecticut.

Overall, the storm caused extensive damage along the East Coast of the United States, amounting to $900 million ($ in today's terms), and was responsible for eight fatalities. The storm was the first significant system to strike the northeastern United States since Hurricane Agnes in 1972 and the first major storm to affect New York and Long Island directly since Hurricane Donna in 1960. It was the last storm to hit the northeast until Hurricane Bob during the 1991 Atlantic hurricane season.

Meteorological history

Gloria began as a tropical wave that moved off the coast of Africa on September 15. It moved westward through the favorable tropical Atlantic Ocean, and organized into a tropical depression the next day while south of Cape Verde. Tracking steadily west-northwestward due to the strong subtropical ridge, the depression continued to strengthen and became Tropical Storm Gloria on the 17th. Conditions for tropical development...
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