Most famous cases of Rapid Weakening over water

[ljmac75]

To go along with that old thread of infamous cases of rapid intensification I've decided to start a little thing on (in)famous cases of rapid weakening. Here's a few of my top examples.

Katrina 2005: (140 kts at 00z on the 29th to 110 kts at 11z at landfall)
Unlike some of the others, this was one of the least notable things about the storm and it didn't prevent an absolute catastrophe from unfolding. Still, a decrease of 30 kts in 11 hours is a pretty big drop.

Lili 2002: (125 kts at 00z on the 3rd to 80 kts at 13z at landfall)
Lili had the highest wind speed ever recorded by a National Data Buoy Center buoy (ten-minute sustained winds of 98 kts). Fortunately for Louisiana it dropped 45 kts and 3 categories prior to landfall.

Milton 2024: (140 kt at 08z on the 9th to 100 kts at 00z at landfall on the 10th)
Unlike some other ones this was completely expected, since Milton was heading into such a hostile environment off the coast of Florida. The weakening was still somewhat more than predicted however, as forecasts on the 9th still called for a landfall as an upper-end 3 to lower-end 4.

Patricia 2015: (180 kt at 18z on the 23rd to 130 kts at 23z at landfall)
Patricia had the highest reliably estimated wind speed of any tropical cyclone on record, the second lowest pressure for a tropical cyclone on record, and, until Otis in 2023, brought the strongest landfall of any hurricane in the Eastern Pacific. It also weakened at an astounding rate for a hurricane still over water.

[sasha_B]

I feel like Lee (2023) fits in here. Remarkably rapid intensification followed by arguably *more* remarkably rapid weakening - though this didn't prevent moderate impacts as an extratropical system further down the line.

[ljmac75]

I've got two more semi-examples I'd like to share.

Hurricane Ethel 1960: 100 kt at 00z, 70 kt at 18z.
Let's be real that 100 kt for Ethel is kinda generous, but there's no doubt it was stronger out in the Gulf than it was at landfall. I might add that prior to reanalysis Ethel was listed as having weakened from 140 kt to 70 kt in the same period.

Hurricane Bret 1999: 120 kt at 18z, 100 kt at landfall at 00z
Hurricane Bret spared the Texas coast from a huge disaster by weakening and making landfall in an area where few people live. Honestly the weakening might be a little overdone, pressure only rose 5 mbar in that time period, and the last recon flight as it was making landfall still recorded 115+ kt winds at flight-level. As it stands though, decrease of 20 kt in the last 6 hours.

[WaveBreaking]

Delta 2020 when mid-level shear made its eyewall collapse in on itself and stopped the storm from being the Wilma 2.0 that models were predicting at the time.

[Ptarmigan]

Hurricane Allen had 155 knot wind before landfall on the south end of Padre Island with 100 knot wind. That is a huge drop.
https://www.weather.gov/lch/1980Allen

[al78]

Hurricane Paloma (2008) dropped 40 kts from 125 kts to 85 kts in the seven hours prior to landfall in Cuba. That might have been a case of one of the most rapid weakening rates over water in the tropics at the time.

[CrazyC83]

I've got two more semi-examples I'd like to share.

Hurricane Ethel 1960: 100 kt at 00z, 70 kt at 18z.
Let's be real that 100 kt for Ethel is kinda generous, but there's no doubt it was stronger out in the Gulf than it was at landfall. I might add that prior to reanalysis Ethel was listed as having weakened from 140 kt to 70 kt in the same period.

Hurricane Bret 1999: 120 kt at 18z, 100 kt at landfall at 00z
Hurricane Bret spared the Texas coast from a huge disaster by weakening and making landfall in an area where few people live. Honestly the weakening might be a little overdone, pressure only rose 5 mbar in that time period, and the last recon flight as it was making landfall still recorded 115+ kt winds at flight-level. As it stands though, decrease of 20 kt in the last 6 hours.

Even if you use that at face value, that observation from Bret supports 105 kt at landfall (a case can be made for 110 kt with the very sparse observations), which is still a decent drop. Even if Bret had made landfall as a category 4, the impacts would not have been tremendously different though given the size and location.

[CrazyC83]

Dramatic weakening happens quite frequently in the EPAC, since storms often reach a wall of shear or cooler water while a powerful hurricane.

One other Atlantic case could be the first weakening of Florence 2018, from 115 kt to 60 kt in 24 hours.