A Furious Sky: The Five-Hundred-Year History of America’s Hurricanes

According to Dolin, the 1954 and 1955 hurricane seasons were watershed moments for improvements in hurricane research and forecasting. This disaster seasons afflicted wealthy New Englanders who demanded a better system of hurricane detection and protection. Robert H. Smith, the pioneer of the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, had a plan to make improvements; however, he struggled to obtain funding from President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s administration. It took the arrival of the destructive Hurricane Connie in 1955 for Eisenhower to take Smith’s proposal seriously and for the National Hurricane Research Project to come into being. This later transformed into the Hurricane Research Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

With the Weather Bureau armed with better forecasting information, its chief advice to those in the path of a hurricane was to evacuate. However, because of poverty, poor health, or sheer disbelief that the hurricane would be serious enough to merit the inconvenience and expense of evacuation, many people remained and faced the consequences. While local news stations played a role in providing forecasting information and hurricane safety tips, power outages meant they were often unable to get their message across in time.

In 1979, President Jimmy Carter created the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) which was tasked with coordinating federal aid for hurricane victims, especially when the damage was beyond the scope of what local authorities could handle.