While this is hurricane season, the emergence of a micro hurricane in the Caribbean is not how things have gone in the past.
5 miles in diameter, cyclonic, and hurricane force winds.
Maybe it has something to do with the fact that the water is almost as hot as a bathtub:
A hurricane so small that it could not be observed by satellite formed this weekend, surprising meteorologists and even forecasters at the National Hurricane Center.
Hurricane Oscar developed on Saturday near Turks and Caicos, and to the northeast of Cuba, in the extreme southwestern Atlantic Ocean. As of Saturday evening, hurricane-force winds extended just 5 miles (8 km) from the center of the storm.
This is not the smallest tropical cyclone—as defined by sustained winds greater than 39 mph, or 63 kph—as that record remains held by Tropical Storm Marco back in 2008. However, this may possibly be the smallest hurricane in terms of the extent of its hurricane-force winds.
………
Writing in his summary of Oscar's development on Saturday afternoon, National Hurricane Center forecaster Philippe Papin noted that the hurricane was only discovered due to a last-minute flight by Air Force Hurricane Hunter aircraft.
"It is fair to say it's been an unexpected day with regards to Oscar," he wrote in his 5 pm ET advisory. "After being upgraded to a tropical storm this morning, a resources-permitting Air Force Reconnaissance mission found that Oscar was much stronger than anticipated and in fact was a tiny hurricane. It is worth noting that remote sensing satellite intensity estimates are currently much lower."
This is not normal.
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