Page 111 - Winterling's Chasing the Wind

reports from coastal weather stations, I placed a black dot for the storm’s center
position and shaded the area within 15 miles each side of the dot to represent the
storm’s threat of strong winds.

The track continued to show the storm moving towards the north-northwest, causing
most of the storm to remain well inland. Cleo’s rains were cooling the storm more than
the peripheral offshore cloud bands could maintain hurricane force winds. The shocker
was when I saw that Daytona Beach was reporting a south wind of 55 mph at 5 AM
while the Hurricane Center said that the storm had returned to the Atlantic and was east
of New Smyrna Beach. This could not be true because winds spin counter-clockwise
around the low indicating, the center was still well inland. If Cleo was over the ocean
southeast of Daytona, their winds have to come from the north.

I reported that Cleo was still weakening and that it would continue to weaken as it
moved through the Jacksonville area around noon. Consequently, our highest wind at
Jacksonville Beach was a 50 mph gust, and Jacksonville’s Imeson Airport reached only
43 mph. And we were under a Hurricane Warning all that time!

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