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1938 Hurricane Westerly RI


Ginx snewx

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  • 2 weeks later...

Blue Hill Mass at elevation measured 186 although that has been questioned, there are antecedotal reports of 150 plus but no one knows for sure. I did not post all the pics but some pics show evidence of possible brief tornado spinups, especially in Westerly which was in the Eastern eyewall.

The 186 mph at Blue Hill is good. (Blue Hill is at 635 feet ASL.) It was estimated that the maximum sustained winds were about 125 mph as the storm passed, with forward motion upwards to 60 mph (yes, that was crazy!). The storm passed well west of the Hill, so basically you add the max sustained winds to the forward motion. Plus, the wind direction at Blue Hill was SSE, which was right up the shear face of the granite hill on that side that likely helped the winds remain high over the Hill.

--Turtle

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  • 2 weeks later...

Yes, I have seen this show and it's pretty good. The best one on the '38 Hurricane was produced by WSBE (RI PBS) in Providence. They usually show this around the anniversary. It has a lot of good interviews and video/photos.

--Turtle

My 6th grade teacher showed it to my class in 1988. I'm starting to feel old.

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The damage that this hurricane did to Rhode Island is amazing. Someone asked what would happen now... the damage would be 10x worse. Pretty much from the CT border to MA border is houses built right on the beach. The amount of damage and trees down from a storm like this nowadays would probably be the most devastating storm in recent US history. Its amazing what happened to Napatree during the storm...

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  • 2 weeks later...

My father lived and worked in the Bay Springs section of Barrington (right on the water) when the storm hit. Lost several neighbors. For the rest of his life, any time there was a big wind storm he had to sleep in the basement - could not stand the sound of the wind. PTSD FTL.

Few still remember it, but for those that do, very sad...

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