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Hurricane Gladys was the first Atlantic hurricane to be observed each by the Hurricane Hunters, radar imagery, and photographs from space. The seventh named storm and fifth hurricane (including one unnamed hurricane) of the 1968 season,〔 Gladys formed on October 13 in the western Caribbean from a broad disturbance related to a tropical wave. The storm moved north-northwestward, becoming a hurricane before striking Cuba on October 16. Gladys later reached peak winds of 85 mph (140 km/h) just before making landfall near Homosassa on the western coast of Florida on October 19. The hurricane crossed the state and continued northeastward, passing just east of Cape Hatteras on October 20. The next day, Gladys became extratropical and was absorbed by a cold front over Nova Scotia. In Cuba, the threat of the hurricane prompted widespread evacuations. Gladys caused flash flooding and heavily damaged the tobacco crop. Damage in the country was estimated at $12 million (1968 USD), and there were six deaths. While passing west of the Florida Keys, the hurricane produced strong winds that briefly cut communications to the Dry Tortugas, but damage was minor. Near where Gladys made landfall, winds gusted to 100 mph (160 km/h) and tides reached above normal. There was heavy beach erosion and flooding along the coast, while the winds knocked down trees and caused power outages. Across the state, damage was estimated at $6.7 million (1968 USD), and three people were indirectly killed. Heavy rainfall in South Carolina caused minor river flooding. When paralleling just off the coast of North Carolina, Gladys was responsible for breaking the state's worst drought since 1932, and proved more beneficial than the minor storm damage there. Later, Gladys killed two people in Atlantic Canada and caused coastal damage in Prince Edward Island. ==Meteorological history== The origins of Hurricane Gladys were from a tropical wave – a trough embedded in the trade winds – that moved across the Lesser Antilles on October 6. For the next few days, the wave moved across the Caribbean Sea without any development. As the wave interacted with the intertropical convergence zone, a large area of convection persisted across the region, spawning a series of low pressure areas. One became a tropical depression near Swan Island offshore Honduras on October 11, and two days later another tropical depression formed near San Andrés island in the extreme southwestern Caribbean. The latter system, which would eventually become Gladys, moved slowly north-northwestward. An anticyclone in the region caused wind shear to decrease, allowing for gradual development. On October 15, a Hurricane Hunters flight observed winds of ; on that basis, the National Hurricane Center (NHC) upgraded the depression to Tropical Storm Gladys. After becoming a tropical storm, Gladys intensified into a hurricane near the Isle of Youth on October 16. Shortly thereafter it crossed the narrow but mountainous region of western Cuba.〔 By the time the hurricane reached the southeastern Gulf of Mexico, a deep trough was moving eastward through the United States toward a weak anticyclone off the east coast. Gladys turned more to the north, passing just west of the Dry Tortugas, before resuming its north-northwest trajectory, possibly due to a mid-level low near Alabama. Around that time, the eye was reorganizing offshore southwestern Florida, and the hurricane failed to intensify significantly due to the eastern portion of the circulation being over the state. Early on October 19, Gladys made landfall near Homosassa after turning to the northeast,〔 with peak winds estimated at 85 mph (130 km/h).〔 It accelerated across the state due to the approaching trough, emerging into the Atlantic near St. Augustine. Paralleling the southeastern coast of the United States, Gladys passed just east of Cape Hatteras on October 20, although by that time the strongest winds remained along the eastern periphery. The approaching trough caused Gladys to gradually lose tropical characteristics, and on October 21 Gladys became extratropical just south of Nova Scotia. A few hours later, the former hurricane was absorbed by the cold front.〔 Hurricane Gladys was active during the Apollo 7 spaceflight mission, and astronauts aboard took several pictures of the hurricane. Later, researchers were able to compare the photographs to airforce reconnaissance data, radar, and local weather networks, the first such hurricane to be observed with such varied data. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Hurricane Gladys (1968)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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