Hurricane Cleo (1964)

After crossing Cuba, Cleo turned north toward the lower east coast of Florida, and the edge of its eye moved onto Key Biscayne at 2 a.m. EST on August 27, 1964.¹ NHC's best track puts the landfall at 0800 UTC that day as a Category 2 hurricane with 95-knot (109 mph) winds and a central pressure of 968 mb.² The Weather Bureau estimated sustained winds of 100 to 105 mph with gusts to 135 mph.¹ Cleo left Florida between St. Augustine and Jacksonville and came back ashore on the Georgia coast as a tropical storm on August 29.^3,2

Major damage hit a strip 20 to 35 miles wide along Florida's east coast from Miami to about Melbourne.¹ Storm surge stayed under 4 feet in the Miami area but reached 5 feet above normal at Fort Lauderdale and 5 to 6 feet above normal at Pompano Beach.³ Buildings in Dade and Broward counties had little structural damage.³ Most of the damage there was broken glass in unprotected storefronts and in Miami Beach hotels and motels, many of which took in water once their windows broke.³ The Weather Bureau estimated Florida property damage at $112.5 million, about $125 million with indirect costs, and reported no deaths in Florida.³

Nine or more tornadoes were reported in Florida and the Carolinas.³ One at Laurinburg, North Carolina, on August 29 injured 15 people and caused $250,000 in damage.⁴ Parts of Tidewater Virginia got 10 to 14 inches of rain in about 12 hours, and NOAA lists 2 deaths and $3 million in damage in Virginia.⁵