The 1989 season

Tropical Storm Marcia (1989)

Tropical Storm Marcia peaked at 35 kt in the South Indian between February 28, 1989 and March 6, 1989, with a lowest pressure of 995 mb.

Track and intensity

The whole track of Tropical Storm Marcia, colored by strength, with the other storms of the 1989 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 Indian
Dates
February 28, 1989 to March 6, 1989
Peak strength
Tropical Storm, 35 kt (40 mph)
Lowest pressure
995 mb (29.38 inHg)
Landfall
No; closest approach 675 km (419 mi)
Accumulated cyclone energy
0.2
Identifier
SH171989

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
Feb 28, 18:009.0S 97.0E20 ktTropical storm
Mar 1, 00:009.2S 97.4E20 ktTropical storm
Mar 1, 06:009.3S 97.8E20 ktTropical storm
Mar 1, 12:009.4S 98.6E20 ktTropical storm
Mar 1, 18:009.9S 99.9E20 ktTropical storm
Mar 2, 00:0011.9S 101.3E20 kt1004 mbTropical storm
Mar 2, 06:0013.9S 101.6E25 kt1004 mbTropical storm
Mar 2, 12:0015.4S 101.4E25 kt1002 mbTropical storm
Mar 2, 18:0016.3S 100.8E30 kt1000 mbTropical storm
Mar 3, 00:0017.1S 100.1E30 kt998 mbTropical storm
Mar 3, 06:0017.7S 99.4E35 kt995 mbTropical storm
Mar 3, 12:0018.5S 98.7E35 kt995 mbTropical storm
Mar 3, 18:0019.2S 98.2E30 kt995 mbTropical storm
Mar 4, 00:0019.7S 97.6E30 kt995 mbTropical storm
Mar 4, 06:0020.8S 97.2E25 kt998 mbTropical storm
Mar 4, 12:0022.0S 96.8E25 kt1000 mbTropical storm
Mar 4, 18:0023.5S 96.7E25 kt1002 mbTropical storm
Mar 5, 00:0025.0S 96.8E25 kt1004 mbTropical storm
Mar 5, 06:0026.5S 96.9E20 kt1004 mbTropical storm
Mar 5, 12:0026.9S 97.0E20 kt1006 mbTropical storm
Mar 5, 18:0028.0S 97.0E20 kt1006 mbTropical storm
Mar 6, 00:0029.3S 97.0E20 kt1006 mbTropical storm
Mar 6, 06:0030.1S 97.0E20 kt1008 mbTropical storm

Other South Indian storms of 1989

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.