The 1981 season

Tropical Storm Cindy (1981)

Tropical Storm Cindy peaked at 50 kt in the North Atlantic between August 2, 1981 and August 5, 1981, with a lowest pressure of 1002 mb.

Radar

Reflectivity now over Tropical Storm Cindy. 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
North Atlantic
Dates
August 2, 1981 to August 5, 1981
Peak strength
Tropical Storm, 50 kt (58 mph)
Lowest pressure
1002 mb (29.59 inHg)
Landfall
No; closest approach 348 km (216 mi)
Accumulated cyclone energy
1.5
Fastest the center moved
25 kt (29 mph)
Identifier
AL091981

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
Aug 2, 18:0036.1N 67.8W30 kt1010 mbSubtropical depression
Aug 3, 00:0036.7N 67.1W30 kt1008 mbSubtropical depression
Aug 3, 06:0037.4N 66.2W30 kt1006 mbSubtropical depression
Aug 3, 12:0038.3N 65.7W30 kt1003 mbTropical depression
Aug 3, 18:0038.7N 64.9W40 kt1003 mbTropical storm
Aug 4, 00:0039.0N 63.8W50 kt1002 mbTropical storm
Aug 4, 06:0039.4N 62.2W50 kt1002 mbTropical storm
Aug 4, 12:0040.4N 60.7W50 kt1003 mbTropical storm
Aug 4, 18:0041.3N 58.4W50 kt1004 mbTropical storm
Aug 5, 00:0042.2N 55.7W45 kt1005 mbTropical storm
Aug 5, 06:0043.3N 52.7W40 kt1006 mbTropical storm
Aug 5, 12:0044.1N 50.4W30 kt1008 mbExtratropical

Other North Atlantic storms of 1981

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.