The 1969 season

Tropical Storm Heather (1969)

Tropical Storm Heather peaked at 55 kt in the Eastern Pacific between September 19, 1969 and September 25, 1969.

Radar

Reflectivity now over Tropical Storm Heather. Open it to see storms, cones and warnings on the map.

Open the live radar with storms, cones and warnings

Radar mosaic and map layers from NOAA MRMS. Boundaries from the Iowa Environmental Mesonet.

The storm

Basin
Eastern Pacific
Dates
September 19, 1969 to September 25, 1969
Peak strength
Tropical Storm, 55 kt (63 mph)
Landfall
No; closest approach 1568 km (974 mi)
Accumulated cyclone energy
2.5
Identifier
EP081969

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.

Track

Time (UTC)PositionWindPressureStatus
Sep 19, 00:0014.5N 122.4W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 19, 06:0014.6N 123.1W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 19, 12:0014.7N 123.7W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 19, 18:0014.9N 124.5W55 ktTropical storm
Sep 20, 00:0015.1N 125.3W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 20, 06:0015.2N 126.1W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 20, 12:0015.4N 126.8W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 20, 18:0015.8N 127.6W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 21, 00:0016.2N 128.3W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 21, 06:0016.4N 128.6W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 21, 12:0016.6N 128.9W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 21, 18:0016.9N 129.4W45 ktTropical storm
Sep 22, 00:0017.1N 129.7W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 22, 06:0017.2N 129.9W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 22, 12:0017.3N 130.0W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 22, 18:0017.4N 130.1W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 23, 00:0017.6N 130.3W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 23, 06:0017.9N 130.6W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 23, 12:0018.2N 131.0W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 23, 18:0018.8N 131.5W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 24, 00:0019.3N 132.0W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 24, 06:0019.7N 132.4W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 24, 12:0020.0N 132.8W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 24, 18:0020.4N 133.3W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 25, 00:0020.7N 133.9W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 25, 06:0021.0N 134.9W25 ktTropical depression
Sep 25, 12:0021.1N 135.9W25 ktTropical depression

Other Eastern Pacific storms of 1969

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.