© NOAA
Hurricane Michael is seen over the Florida Panhandle in mid-October 2018.
, which devastated a swath of the Florida Panhandle last fall, was actually stronger than initially measured, prompting forecasters to upgrade it from a Category 4 storm to a Category 5 storm, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration
announced Friday.
Michael was the first hurricane to make landfall in the U.S. as a Category 5 since Hurricane Andrew in 1992, and only the fourth on record.
"My thought is simply that most of us thought we were dealing with a (Category) 5 anyway," said Al Cathey, mayor of Mexico Beach, which bore the brunt of the storm when it hit.
National Hurricane Center scientists conducted a detailed post-storm analysis for Hurricane Michael, which made landfall near Mexico Beach, Florida, and Tyndall Air Force Base on October 10, 2018. They've determined that its estimated intensity at landfall was 160 mph, a 5 mph increase over the operational estimate used last fall, NOAA said in a news release. That puts Michael just barely over the 157 mph threshold for a category 5 hurricane.
"Michael is also the strongest hurricane landfall on record in the Florida Panhandle and only the second known Category 5 landfall on the northern Gulf coast," the hurricane center said in a statement.
Just 36 hours before hitting Florida's coast, Michael was making its way through the Gulf of Mexico as a 90 mph Category 1 storm. But the reclassification doesn't come with the much-needed state and federal funding Cathey said is necessary to rebuild. "Whether it was a 5 or a 4, it really isn't relative to anything for most of us who are here. It's just another number," Cathey said Friday.
Comment: Unusually high level of landslides worldwide - Over 1000 fatalities so far this year