Updated on Friday, August 23, 2024, 9:30 a.m. ET

On this day 32 years ago, South Florida was bracing for a hurricane. It was surreal. Hurricanes hadn’t been a part of life for decades. Every year when June 1st came, it was a yawn – hurricane season, haha!

Hurricane David passed through the area in 1979 as it passed offshore, but it had been 27 years since a major hurricane had threatened the Miami metropolitan area from the east. Hurricane Betsy eventually passed over the Upper Florida Keys, but the strong winds drove the storm surge over Miami Beach. Huge waves crashed through the windows of fancy oceanfront hotels. A quarter of the animals at the Miami Zoo on Key Biscayne died in their cages when seawater flooded the island.

After three major hurricanes in the 1960s and other horror scenarios, Mother Nature turned off the hurricane tap that had been ravaging South Florida with severe storms since the first decade of the 20th century. But now Andrew was a reality.

Some old hands took their time, because there was an old-fashioned hurricane rule for Miami that said we were safe whenever a storm passed north of Miami’s latitude (which was the case with Andrew). In other words, storms didn’t turn south; they just arced north. That’s true, of course, except when it’s not.

Some South Florida residents had not yet learned that Sunday morning that a mega-hurricane was approaching. But by evening, South Florida was quiet. People were where they were waiting to ride out the storm while they waited and wondered what the night would bring.

As the sun rose that morning, the satellite view was stunning. Andrew looked like a hurricane graphic, not a real storm. This image was taken by the NOAA-12 satellite, which had special high-resolution capabilities. Looking at it today, it’s easy to imagine what awaited us – Mother Nature at her most magnificent and threatening.

The National Hurricane Center issued a special alert at 8 a.m., issuing a hurricane warning for the southern coast of the Florida Peninsula and the Florida Keys. The warning zone extended as far north as Vero Beach, as the 1992 forecasts were still uncertain even a day before landfall. Here is the special intergovernmental discussion, written by hurricane specialist (and later NHC director) Max Mayfield.

When the plane reported its data, it was surprising, but it wasn’t true. Pressure was dropping rapidly, but the satellite imagery was so impressive that we knew Andrew was rapidly strengthening. Peak winds reached Category 4 at 11:00 am.

Grocery store shelves were bare of anything that could be considered hurricane supplies. There was some negativity when stores ran out of plywood to cover windows, but by and large everyone went about their business stunned and in good spirits.

After taking care of the shutters on my house, I arrived at WTVJ’s studios and downtown Miami at 8 a.m. After much discussion and concern for our news crews, I sat down at the news desk at 9 a.m., knowing my shift would likely be all night.

The National Hurricane Center’s forecast was stable as far south as Dade County, south of downtown Miami. But on that Sunday, I thought the chances of the storm hitting Fort Lauderdale were just as good as Miami, Homestead or the Keys. My message was that all of South Florida needed to prepare.

Evacuations were ordered for the beach communities and low-lying areas. Many people left the city. Traffic on all roads north was slow but steady. Many people, however, stayed. No one could have imagined that the waters of the ocean and bay would wash over the barrier islands and through the city. I could imagine it because I had studied Miami hurricanes in the past.

That afternoon, we saw Andrew reach its peak intensity as it approached the Bahamas. Modern estimates put peak winds at 160 mph as the eye of the hurricane crossed the northern tip of the island of Eleuthera.

The computer forecast models available to the National Hurricane Center for the 5 p.m. warning showed overwhelming agreement that Andrew was heading toward South Florida. The AVN model (now called GFS) was too far south and too fast. The remaining models, including the NHC90, which made dire predictions in previous days, were all focused on Dade County, if a little too slow.

By evening, the possible became probable and then inevitable. That night, the worst-case scenario would happen. The only question was, which part of South Florida would suffer the most?

By midnight, the eye of Hurricane Andrew was fully within range of the Miami National Weather Service radar. The venerable WSR-57 radar was located on the roof of the National Hurricane Center building in Coral Gables, south of downtown Miami. Looking at the radar image today, I find it more frightening than I remembered that night.

Will the storm move north? Or south? Where will the corridor of strongest winds pass through South Florida? How can people protect themselves during such a storm? These were the questions that ran through our minds as Sunday night turned into August 24, 1992.

The tropical Atlantic remains surprisingly quiet in 2024. The disturbances coming from Africa are strong and we would normally have to watch them closely. But they move far enough north to immediately become entangled in Saharan dust, so they are unlikely to survive the journey west. There are no signs of any potential threats for at least the rest of August.

In the Pacific, Tropical Storm Hone is moving toward Hawaii. The center will likely track south of the islands, but thick tropical moisture will bring heavy rains and possible mudslides and flooding on the windward side of the Big Island starting tomorrow.

The heaviest rain will likely fall in the mauka areas (as Hawaiians call the area above a road over the mountain) on the windward slopes. The east side of the Big Island is expected to see 4 to 8 inches of rain, along with winds strong enough to knock out power. The smaller islands to the west will see less but still significant rainfall.

Impacts will begin on the Big Island at noon Saturday (Hawaii time) and spread to the other islands by early next week. Stay updated on the latest information and instructions from emergency officials on the islands.