The 1955 season

Tropical Storm Brenda (1955)

Tropical Storm Brenda peaked at 60 kt in the North Atlantic between July 31, 1955 and August 3, 1955, and made landfall.

Track and intensity

The whole track of Tropical Storm Brenda, colored by strength, with the other storms of the 1955 season in the same basin behind it, and its wind and pressure hour by hour. Every fix is in the track table below.

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The storm

Basin
North Atlantic
Dates
July 31, 1955 to August 3, 1955
Peak strength
Tropical Storm, 60 kt (69 mph)
Landfall
Yes
Accumulated cyclone energy
2.0
Fastest the center moved
11 kt (13 mph)
Identifier
AL011955

Deaths and damage

No source this site reads publishes a machine-readable casualty or damage figure for a storm of this era. The National Hurricane Center’s season tables begin in 1995 and carry deaths and damage only from 2005 in the Atlantic and 2020 in both basins; the US Storm Events record begins in 1996.

Landfall

Time (UTC)WherePositionWindPressure
Aug 1, 17:00Port Sulphur, LA, 37 km away29.7N 89.4W55 kt (63 mph)

Landfall points the US agencies flagged in the best track. The nearest town is named from the site’s gazetteer, not from the report.

Rainfall

The Weather Prediction Center attributes 2,427 rain gauge totals over the contiguous United States to this storm. The wettest reached 11.20 inches (284 mm).

StationTotalPosition
VIOLET11.20 in (284 mm)29.92N 89.90W
VANCLEAVE11.10 in (282 mm)30.49N 88.66W
MANSFIELD 4 NW10.86 in (276 mm)32.07N 93.76W
SAUCIER EXP FOREST8.76 in (223 mm)30.63N 89.06W
PORT SULPHUR8.31 in (211 mm)29.48N 89.70W
NEW ORLEANS D P S 58.24 in (209 mm)29.98N 90.02W
BURAS8.00 in (203 mm)29.34N 89.52W
WIGGINS7.88 in (200 mm)30.87N 89.12W
MC HENRY 5 ESE7.64 in (194 mm)30.68N 89.07W
BON WIER7.09 in (180 mm)30.73N 93.65W
DE RIDDER7.00 in (178 mm)30.84N 93.29W
GRAND ECORE6.94 in (176 mm)31.81N 93.09W

WPC’s storm rainfall file, 1900 to 2020, compiled by David Roth.

Track

Time (UTC)PositionWindPressureStatus
Jul 31, 06:0027.5N 87.5W30 ktTropical depression
Jul 31, 12:0027.6N 87.9W40 ktTropical storm
Jul 31, 18:0027.8N 88.2W50 ktTropical storm
Aug 1, 00:0028.2N 88.4W60 ktTropical storm
Aug 1, 06:0028.6N 88.6W60 ktTropical storm
Aug 1, 12:0029.3N 89.0W60 ktTropical storm
Aug 1, 17:00 landfall29.7N 89.4W55 ktTropical storm
Aug 1, 18:0029.9N 89.5W55 ktTropical storm
Aug 2, 00:0030.6N 90.4W40 ktTropical storm
Aug 2, 06:0031.1N 91.6W30 ktTropical depression
Aug 2, 12:0031.5N 92.8W25 ktTropical depression
Aug 2, 18:0031.8N 93.8W25 ktTropical depression
Aug 3, 00:0032.2N 94.7W25 ktTropical depression
Aug 3, 06:0032.7N 95.0W20 ktTropical depression

Other North Atlantic storms of 1955

What this means

A best track is the record a warning agency settles on after the storm, not what it said at the time: position, maximum sustained wind and central pressure every six hours, revised against every observation that came in later. Category is the Saffir-Simpson scale, which runs from Category 1 at 64 kt to Category 5 at 137 kt and reads wind only, so it says nothing about surge or rain. Accumulated cyclone energy adds up the square of the wind through the storm's life, so it counts strength and duration together.

Sources

Storm history from NOAA NCEI’s International Best Track Archive for Climate Stewardship (IBTrACS), which merges the official best track of every warning agency. Live storms, cones, watches and warnings from the National Hurricane Center and the Central Pacific Hurricane Center. Archived radar from NOAA’s Level II archive.

The National Hurricane Center has published no tropical cyclone report for this storm.