 | It has been suggested that this article be merged into Hurricane Iota. (Discuss) Proposed since October 2024. |
 Track of Iota, according to the Saffir-Simpson scale | |
| Meteorological history | |
|---|---|
| Formed | November 13, 2020 |
| Remnant low | November 18 |
| Dissipated | November 19, 2020 |
| Category 4 major hurricane | |
| 1-minute sustained (SSHWS/NWS) | |
| Highest winds | 155 mph (250 km/h) |
| Lowest pressure | 917 mbar (hPa); 27.08 inHg |
| Overall effects | |
| Areas affected | Lesser Antilles, Puerto Rico, Hispaniola, Guyana Venezuela, Colombia, Central America, Mexico |
Part of the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season | |
Hurricane Iota was the second-most powerful November tropical cyclone on record in the Atlantic basin, behind only the 1932 Cuba hurricane. It was also the strongest and most intense hurricane of the hyperactive 2020 Atlantic hurricane season. At the end of October, a tropical wave emerged off Africa and traversed the Atlantic Ocean with little note. The system later impacted northern South America and the Lesser Antilles before becoming more organized, eventually becoming a tropical depression on November 13 over the Caribbean Sea. Initially stymied by adverse environmental conditions the system, which soon became Tropical Storm Iota, struggled to organize as it took an atypical southwest track. After developing a small, well-organized core, Iota entered a region exceptionally favorable for explosive intensification and dramatically developed. Within a 42-hour period from November 15 to 16, Iota strengthened from a tropical storm to a high-end Category 4 hurricane with peak winds of 155 mph (249 km/h). The hurricane's eyewall impacted the Colombian islands of Providencia and Santa Catalina around this time. Moving along a westward course, Iota slowly weakened and eventually made landfall in Nicaragua with winds of 145 mph (233 km/h) in nearly the same location as Hurricane Eta two weeks prior. Once inland, interaction with the region's mountainous terrain caused the system to rapidly deteriorate and its surface circulation dissipated on November 18. Its remnants persisted another day before last being noted southwest of Guatemala.
Iota bolstered records set during the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season and became one of the fastest intensifying hurricanes ever observed. Its rate of intensification in a 42-hour period was only exceeded by Hurricanes Rita and Wilma in 2005. The compounding devastation it caused just two weeks after Eta led to the retirement of the letter Iota in 2021.[nb 1] Collectively, the two hurricanes killed at least 259 people and inflicted more than $9 billion in damage.[1]
- ^ a b "WMO Hurricane Committee retires tropical cyclone names and ends the use of Greek alphabet" (Press release). World Meteorological Organization. March 17, 2021. Archived from the original on December 18, 2023. Retrieved May 21, 2021.
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