Last year’s historic tropical storm may not have been so historic after all.
What was initially believed to be Tropical Storm (and former hurricane) Hilary was actually a post-tropical low when it hit California, according to a report by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Hurricane Center.
“On its approach to land — and even more so after it made landfall — the thunderstorm activity became increasingly disorganized and it lost its well-defined center at the surface, and those are two necessary criteria for something to be considered a tropical cyclone,” Brad Reinhart, the report’s author and a hurricane specialist with the NHC, told the Los Angeles Times.
With that finding, Southern California’s 84-year streak without a tropical storm remains intact.
Despite losing tropical storm status, Hilary still made a major impact, as it “blew past daily rainfall records across Southern California,” the Times reported in the aftermath.
It also was half of a new weather-related sensation: the “hurriquake” that was created when a magnitude 5.1 earthquake hit near Ojai amid the storm.