History of MoCo Hurricanes: How likely are they?

 The devastation from recent hurricanes Milton and Helene, has raised a question for us here in Moco: are we in any danger of getting hit by a hurricane? According to CNN, 213 people are confirmed dead from Helene across six states, making Helene the deadliest hurricane to hit the United States mainland since Hurricane Katrina in 2005. According to CNN, thousands of Floridians are rebuilding their communities after Hurricane Milton made landfall as a deadly Category 3 storm and cut through the state, bringing destructive storm surge to parts of Florida’s western shore and deadly tornadoes to the east while killing at least 17 people. As you can see, these hurricanes can wreak havoc on the areas they 

Losing power is a common occurrence when it comes to hurricanes. According to CNN Milton and Helene, “More than 850,000 customers in seven states from Florida to West Virginia still were without power as of Thursday evening, according to PowerOutage.us. Most are in the Carolinas, where regional energy provider Duke Energy says “major portions of the power grid … were simply wiped away.”

  Helene’s floodwaters took out so many power poles and electric lines, that infrastructure needs to be rebuilt before power is restored. Now that we know all this, what are the chances of a destructive hurricane impacting us in MD Montgomery County?

We sat down with science and former environmental science teacher Mr. O’Connor and asked him about those recent hurricanes and the possibility of a storm impacting us here. According to him, “It is more likely over here than the midwest but more unlikely than Florida or Georgia.” His estimate on the percentage of that happening is about 30%. The reason being we are sheltered by too much land and would have too strong wind currents to go against it to go through us with the heated-up currents.

Has there been a hurricane in Maryland Montgomery County before?

Yes, Hurricane Isabel was serious enough to close schools in 2003. According to MCPS, all schools were closed to prepare for emergency conditions expected from the storm.

While the storm was bad in 2003, this was one of the rare instances of a real hurricane severely threatening and affecting MCPS. 

Although hurricanes have happened before it’s a low chance of being over a category 3 according to Google. ”An unnamed category 2 in October of 1878, an unnamed category 1 in 1893, and an unnamed category 1 in 1933. These have all been under category 3. There Never has a major hurricane (category 3 or higher) directly hit.” Especially in Montgomery County since we are not directly close to the ocean, the water has to get heated up to make it through all the towns and make actual damage. Plus, we have to have occurring winds going against the warm water, Mr. O’Connor added.

Mr. O’Connor also stated that Maryland is impacted by flooding similar to Florida and wouldn’t take much for Maryland, more specifically MOCO to be hit by flooding or a storm surge.  Making sure we don’t build in predominantly wetland areas. For houses already built in those areas building up sea walls is mandatory to ensure safety. 

You can’t stop hurricanes but you can prevent extensive damage. Although it is very rare for hurricanes to happen in Montgomery County it can still happen. It is important that we pay attention to important news and head warnings.