Hurricane Iota made landfall along the northeast coast of Nicaragua yesterday evening as a 155mph category 4 hurricane. The landfall location was 12 miles south of where category 4 hurricane Eta made landfall 13 days ago. An unconfirmed wind gust of 124mph was reported, but most of the wind measuring devices were destroyed by Eta and there has been very little information from the impacted area overnight. Iota peaked yesterday at 160mph (category 5) intensity prior to landfall making it the strongest hurricane of 2020 and second strongest November hurricane on record since 1851 only behind the 1932 Cuba hurricane (175mph).
With Iota reaching category 5 intensity yesterday, 2020 becomes the 5th straight Atlantic basin hurricane season to produce a category 5 hurricane…Matthew (2016), Irma and Maria (2017), Michael (2018), Dorian and Lorenzo (2019), and now Iota (2020). The previous year with a category 5 hurricane in the Atlantic basin before 2016 was Felix in 2007.
Iota is now moving inland and quickly weakening over central America and this trend will continue today with the storm dissipating on Wednesday. Heavy rains of 20-30 inches on to of the 25-35 inches this area experienced during Eta will result in life threatening inland flash floods and mudslides.
This is the second time this hurricane season the two hurricane have made landfall very within 15 miles of each other…Laura and Delta in Louisiana and now Eta and Iota in Nicaragua.
Southwest Caribbean Sea:
As Iota dissipates a new area of potential development will move into the SW Caribbean Sea toward the end of the week. Some global models predict a tropical wave will slow down and attempt to develop a low level circulation in the same general area as Eta and Iota. This continues to be a very favored area late in this season with high pressure to the north, slow trade winds, and favorable La Nina pattern aloft coupled with continued extremely warm sea surface temperatures. The current 5 day development potential is 40%.
Jeff Lindner
Director Hydrologic Operations Division/Meteorologist
Harris County Flood Control District