Remembering the hurricane of 1938

(AP Photo)

Downtown Providence was submerged in the storm, which killed an estimated 700 people.

By Kasey Wickman, Globe Correspondent

Tomorrow is the 70th anniversary of the hurricane of 1938, a storm that hammered New England, killing an estimated 700 people and leaving 100,000 homeless.

In Massachusetts, wind gusts of up to 183 mph were recorded at Blue Hill’s observatory, and Boston residents hunkered down under winds of about 100 mph. The force of the wind shattered plate glass windows, uprooted trees and knocked out power.

Two crewmen on a tugboat drowned in the Boston Harbor when their boat capsized. At Woods Hole, three Coast Guardsmen died in the sea. Off Nahant, four on a yacht were lost. Fall River, Marlborough and Northampton were placed under martial law after reports of looting. The storm flooded communities as it tore through Cape Cod and other coastal areas.

Glenn Field, a meteorologist at the Taunton office of the National Weather Service, said the hurricane was “incredibly destructive,” and pointed out that it was stronger than the recent Hurricane Ike, which came ashore in Texas as a Category 2 storm.

The 1938 hurricane, which hit in the days before hurricanes were officially named, "was similar to Katrina in terms of wind speed, but moving faster than Katrina, which would lead to stronger gusts,” he said.

New England has seen four major hurricanes, Category 3 or worse, in the last century, the latest being Hurricane Gloria in 1985. Field said that the 1938 storm was the most devastating to ever hit the region, but added that it could have been much worse if there had been a slight deviation in the track of the storm to the east, which would have caused a "hellacious" storm surge in Buzzards Bay.

“That was the worst one we’ve had,” Field said, “But it actually could have been a little worse.”

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