Hurricane Pali

rdf:langString Hurricane Pali

rdf:langString Hurricane Pali

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rdf:langString Satellite image of Hurricane Pali at center; white clouds cover the center of the image over a blue background.

rdf:langString Pali 2016-01-13 0030Z.jpg

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rdf:langString Hurricane Pali was the earliest-forming Pacific hurricane on record, and the first Pacific hurricane to occur in January since Hurricane Ekeka in 1992. The first tropical cyclone of the 2016 Pacific hurricane season, Pali originated as an area of low pressure within a persistent trough, near the equator on January 6, 2016. Deep convection gradually built up around the center of the disturbance as the system curved northward, before it organized into a tropical depression on the next day, making the system the earliest recorded tropical cyclone in the Pacific hurricane basin. The system quickly reached tropical storm status and was named Pali. For the next couple of days, Pali slowly moved northward, while slowly curving towards the west, and the storm strengthened somewhat before weakening, due to the presence of wind shear. On January 10, Pali slowly turned eastward and proceeded to re-strengthen, as wind shear diminished. On January 12, Pali strengthened further into a Category 1 hurricane on the Saffir–Simpson scale (SSWHS), while curving towards the south. On January 13, Pali reached its peak intensity as a Category 2 hurricane, with 1-minute maximum sustained winds of 100 mph (155 km/h) and a minimum central pressure of 978 mbar (hPa; 28.88 inHg). Afterward, Pali quickly began to weaken, as the storm encountered stronger wind shear, with the storm falling to Category 1 intensity several hours later, before weakening into a tropical storm later that day. On January 14, Pali weakened into a tropical depression, before degenerating into a remnant low by January 15, as conditions became increasingly hostile. Later that day, Pali's remnants dissipated, near the same location where the storm had formed roughly a week ago. Pali formed and tracked near the equator, forming at a latitude of 3.3°N and tracking as low as 2.3°N as a tropical depression. This made Pali the second-lowest latitude tropical cyclone on record in the Western Hemisphere, which was extremely unusual, given the unfavorable conditions that are usually in place around the equator. Pali had severe impacts in Kiribati, grounding a cargo ship and killing four people, in addition to causing major coastal flooding, though the amount of damage caused by the storm was not specified in the island nation's report to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).