Isaac's Storm

Categories: In the News , History , Science , Outdoors & Nature , Nonfiction

It’s hurricane season once again, with the recent anniversary of Hurricane Katrina serving as a grim reminder.  On September 8, 1900, an even deadlier hurricane swept the coast of Galveston, Texas, killing as many as 10,000 people and changing the city forever. 

Erik Larson, bestselling author of The Devil in the White City, tells the story of this hurricane and its impact on Isaac Cline, the meteorologist who believed no storm could ever seriously damage Galveston.

Isaac’s Storm: A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History combines the science of weather with personal accounts of survivors to track the hurricane from beginning to devastating end.  At the eye of the storm are Isaac Cline, the rivalry with his fellow weatherman (and younger brother) Joseph, and the overconfidence of the age, when turn-of-the-century meteorology (and the newly formed United States Weather Bureau) could not prepare the residents of Galveston for a hurricane of this magnitude.  By the time they realized evacuation was necessary, it was too late.