Hurricane Dean
Hurricane Dean was a powerful and destructive tropical cyclone that became the strongest of the 2007 Atlantic hurricane season. It ties with Hurricane Mitch for the tenth most intense Atlantic hurricane by atmospheric pressure. Additionally, it made the fifth most intense landfall in the basin by central pressure. A Cape Verde hurricane that formed on August 13, 2007, Dean took a west-northwest path from the eastern Atlantic Ocean through the Saint Lucia Channel and into the Caribbean Sea. It strengthened into a major hurricane, reaching Category 5 status on the Saffir–Simpson scale before passing just south of Jamaica on August 20. The storm made landfall on the Yucatán Peninsula on August 21 at peak intensity. It crossed the peninsula and emerged into the Bay of Campeche weakened, but still remained a hurricane. It strengthened briefly before making a second landfall near Tecolutla in the Mexican state of Veracruz on August 22. Dean drifted to the northwest, weakening into a remnant low which dissipated uneventfully over the southwestern United States. Dean was the second-most intense tropical cyclone worldwide of 2007 in terms of pressure, only behind Cyclone George in the Australian region, and tied with Felix as the most intense worldwide in terms of 1-minute sustained winds.
The hurricane's intense winds, waves, rains and storm surge were responsible for at least 45 deaths across ten countries and caused estimated damages of US$1.66 billion. First impacting the islands of the Lesser Antilles, Dean's path through the Caribbean devastated agricultural crops, particularly those of Martinique and Jamaica. Upon reaching Mexico, Hurricane Dean was a Category 5 storm, but it missed major population centers and its exceptional Category 5 strength landfall caused no deaths and less damage than in the Caribbean islands it passed as a Category 2 storm.
Through the affected regions, clean up and repair took months to complete. Donations solicited by international aid organizations joined national funds in clearing roads, rebuilding houses, and replanting destroyed crops. In Jamaica, banana production did not return to pre-storm levels for over a year. Mexico's tourist industry took almost a year to rebuild its damaged cruise ship infrastructure.
Dean was the first hurricane to make landfall in the Atlantic basin at Category 5 intensity since Hurricane Andrew on August 24, 1992. The hurricane's long swath of damage resulted in its name retirement from the World Meteorological Organization's Atlantic hurricane naming lists.
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