 Before the invention of the telegraph in the early to mid-19th century, news was as fast as the quickest horse, stage, or ship.Normally, there was no advance warning of a tropical cyclone impact.However, the situation changed in the 19th century as seafaring people and land-based researchers, such as Father Viñes in Cuba, came up with systematic methods of reading the sky's appearance or the sea state, which could foretell a tropical cyclone's approach up to a couple days in advance.