On this date in 1878, a calendar-day record 3.31 inches of rain fell as a hurricane tore through the D.C. area. It is considered the strongest hurricane on record to affect the region.
“Trees were uprooted and buildings unroofed during the storm,” the National Weather Service wrote in a report. “Fields of corn were submerged in the ensuing flood around the District of Columbia. Rock Creek became a raging river, but produced little damage. Many young shade trees in the city were leveled. ... Flooding from the Potomac inundated many basements downtown along Pennsylvania Avenue. County roads crossing the Stickfoot branch of the Anacostia River were washed out.”
The Weather Service said that the storm damage in Baltimore was comparable to a tornado with many homes unroofed, several destroyed.
The hurricane, which made landfall in North Carolina, sprinted north through Virginia, Maryland, Pennsylvania and into New York state in less than 24 hours, also causing severe damage in Delaware and New Jersey.
“The storm cut a wide swath of devastation, sinking or driving aground ships in the Atlantic and the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays,” according to a report from the Delaware Geological Society. “Over 100 fatalities were the result of the hurricane, many of them the result of drowning in shipwrecks.”
Here are other notables from this date:
- Average high: 67
- Average low: 49
- Record high: 85 (1978)
- Record low: 33 (1969)
- Record rainfall: 3.31 inches (1878)
- Record snowfall: Trace (1889)
