Gilbert became the most intense hurricane ever recorded in Mississippi in terms of barometric pressure when a low of 26.13 was recorded. Bob Sheets, who became Director of the National Hurricane Center in March, 1987, said that he had flown into hurricanes 200 times and it is not difficult. Gilbert became a Category 5 storm when its winds reached 175 mph. Gilbert has been compared to the Labor Day hurricane in 1935 that killed 408 people in Florida, and to Hurricane Camille in 1969 which killed 256. The last major hurricane to make landfall was Elena in 1985, along the Mississippi, Alabama and Florida Panhandle.
Gilbert became the most intense hurricane ever recorded in the Western Hemisphere in terms of barometric pressure when a low of 26.13 was recorded. Bob Sheets, who became Director of the National Hurricane Center in March, 1987, said that he had flown into hurricanes 200 times and it is not difficult. Gilbert became a Category 5 storm when its winds reached 175 mph. Gilbert has been compared to the Labor Day hurricane in 1935 that killed 408 people in Florida, and to Hurricane Camille in 1969 which killed 256. The last major hurricane to make landfall was Elena in 1985, along the Mississippi, Alabama and Florida Panhandle.