Hurricane Erin (2025)

Hurricane Erin was a large, long-lived, and powerful Cape Verde hurricane that crossed the Atlantic Ocean in August 2025. The fifth named storm, first hurricane, first major hurricane, and first Category 5 hurricane of the 2025 Atlantic hurricane season, Erin developed from a tropical wave on August 11, while passing westward over Cape Verde. Afterwards, it stayed at tropical storm status due to marginally favorable conditions as it crossed the central Atlantic the next few days. As it neared the Lesser Antilles, it strengthened into a hurricane on August 15. Highly favorable conditions enabled Erin to undergo explosive intensification on August 16, reaching its peak at Category 5 intensity with one-minute maximum sustained winds of 160 mph (260 km/h) and a minimum pressure of 913 mb (27.0 inHg). An eyewall replacement cycle occurred later that day, and as a result, Erin fluctuated in intensity before subsequently weakening due to increasing vertical wind shear and dry air entrainment. It grew even larger while remaining steady in intensity while paralleling the East Coast of the United States from August 19 to 21. Erin turned eastward by August 22 as it began losing tropical characteristics, completing its extratropical transition later that day before fully dissipating early on August 28.

Erin's precursor brought intense flooding to various islands in Cape Verde, resulting in nine fatalities on São Vicente and leaving two people missing. Over 178 mm (7 in) of rain fell within five hours between 01:00 and 06:00 UTC on August 11. The government of Cape Verde issued a disaster declaration for São Vicente and Santo Antão the same day. A few days later, Erin killed one person in the Dominican Republic. Erin later produced life-threatening surf and rip currents along much of the east coast of the United States. While paralleling the coast as a Category 2 hurricane, its tropical-storm-force wind field spanned nearly 575 mi (925 km), making it larger than most hurricanes of comparable intensity recorded near the U.S. Atlantic coast. Since the start of the satellite era in 1966, only Hurricane Sandy in 2012 was larger. According to Aon, damage was estimated at US$25 million.