The 1986 season

Tropical Storm Vernon (1986)

Tropical Storm Vernon peaked at 45 kt in the South Pacific between January 21, 1986 and January 25, 1986, with a lowest pressure of 990 mb, and made landfall.

Track and intensity

The whole track of Tropical Storm Vernon, colored by strength, with the other storms of the 1986 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
South Pacific
Dates
January 21, 1986 to January 25, 1986
Peak strength
Tropical Storm, 45 kt (52 mph)
Lowest pressure
990 mb (29.23 inHg)
Landfall
Yes
Accumulated cyclone energy
1.1
Identifier
SH111986

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
Jan 21, 00:0016.4S 139.5E20 kt1000 mbTropical storm
Jan 21, 06:0016.4S 140.1E25 kt999 mbTropical storm
Jan 21, 12:0016.5S 140.8E25 kt999 mbTropical storm
Jan 21, 18:0016.6S 141.2E30 kt997 mbTropical storm
Jan 22, 00:0016.7S 141.8E20 kt997 mbTropical storm
Jan 22, 06:0016.7S 142.5E25 kt996 mbTropical storm
Jan 22, 12:0016.8S 143.2E25 kt996 mbTropical storm
Jan 22, 18:0016.9S 143.9E20 kt996 mbTropical storm
Jan 23, 00:0017.1S 145.1E20 kt996 mbTropical storm
Jan 23, 06:0017.5S 146.8E30 kt995 mbTropical storm
Jan 23, 12:0017.4S 147.8E30 kt995 mbTropical storm
Jan 23, 18:0018.1S 150.0E40 kt991 mbTropical storm
Jan 24, 00:0019.1S 152.2E45 kt990 mbTropical storm
Jan 24, 06:0020.2S 154.5E45 kt992 mbTropical storm
Jan 24, 12:0021.5S 156.9E45 kt994 mbTropical storm
Jan 24, 18:0022.8S 159.4E40 kt995 mbTropical storm
Jan 25, 00:0024.2S 162.1E35 kt997 mbTropical storm
Jan 25, 06:0026.0S 165.0E30 kt997 mbNot reported

Other South Pacific storms of 1986

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.