within the trough on the 19 March, and moved east-southeastward until 22 March, when a ridge to its southeast kept it stationary. With exceptionally favorable upper level winds and slightly below average wind shear, as well as marginally warm, water temperatures from , it gradually developed tropical characteristics, resembling a subtropical storm by the 24 March. Located east-southeast of Florianópolis, it headed slowly westward, and appeared to become a tropical storm on 25 March. A compact storm, the cyclone continued westward while steadily intensifying. The structure of the storm continued to improve, and due to a definite eye feature showing on satellites, the storm was determined to have become a hurricane-equivalent cyclone on 26 March. The storm attained wind speeds of —equivalent to a low-end Category 1 hurricane on the Saffir–Simpson Hurricane wind scale (SSHWS)—on 26 March, making the cyclone the first hurricane-strength tropical cyclone ever recorded in the Southern Atlantic Ocean. Around this time, a Brazilian newspaper had a headline "Furacão Catarina" (i.e. "hurricane [threatening the state of Santa] Catarina"). Partially because of this headline, the storm was unofficially named Catarina. Unusually favorable conditions persisted and Catarina continued to intensify, and Catarina was estimated to have peaked with 1-minute sustained winds of on 28 March. Catarina continued to encounter favorable conditions and reached its peak intensity on early 28 March, with a minimum central pressure of and estimated 1-minute sustained winds of , which made the storm the equivalent of a Category 2 hurricane on the Saffir–Simpson scale. Wind gusts peaked at around . Soon afterward, the hurricane made landfall on the southern coast of Santa Catarina and northeastern Rio Grande do Sul, with winds up to overnight. After making landfall, Catarina rapidly weakened over land, in the normal manner of a tropical cyclone, dissipating later that day. Naming Brazilian meteorologists named the storm Catarina for its proximity to (and eventual landfall near) the state of Santa Catarina, although government forecasters initially denied that the storm, which clearly had an open eye and various other tropical morphologies, was a hurricane at all. More than a year after the storm made landfall, Brazilian meteorologists finally classified the storm as a tropical cyclone. North American forecasters, however surprised as they were, considered this storm a hurricane immediately upon reviewing the satellite-derived evidence. Since Catarina had a clear eyewall structure bounded by deep convective, dense central overcast, well-defined spiral outer bands and