How Do Hurricanes Form?
9. Hurricane Categories
Once the storm has been officially designated as a hurricane, there are another 5 categories under the hurricane umbrella. The least severe is category 1 and storms might increase to the highest category, which is category 5. A hurricane is considered to be category 5 when its winds reached an incredible 157 mph.
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The highest recorded wind in a hurricane was hurricane Patricia in 2015 that had winds measured at 215 mph, although this had decreased to 150 mph by the time it reached land. There have been 36 recorded category 5 hurricanes between 1924 and 2019 and not all of these have made landfall.
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