Wednesday, June 27, 2018

Father Benito Viñes




Spain/Cuba 1837-1893

Father Benito Viñes was a Jesuit famous for his meteorological work in Cuba. He came to Cuba to direct the Jesuit Meteorological Observatory of the College of Belén, but became famous for creating created the first system to accurately predict hurricanes. He became known as “Father Hurricane” and “Founder of Tropical Meteorology.” (2, 3)

The former director of the Observatory after getting financial backing to upgrade the Cuban Observatory had left for France… only for the ten-year Cuban uprising to start. He never actually returned to Cuba, though he did continue to publish papers on cloud structure and hurricanes. (5)

Fr. Viñes, on the other hand was experiencing the 1868 revolution in Spain that sparked the Cuban revolution, so he left for France and was ordained. He was then assigned to Cuba to the Observatory at the College of Benén in Havana. (5) Fr. Viñes arrived at the Cuban Observatory in 1870 and before the year was out, a hurricane arrived and ripped the metal roof off of his observatory. (4, 5) After this harrowing experience, and because of hurricanes’ effects on the populace, Fr. Viñes dedicated his life to understanding the patterns of hurricanes. (4, 7) Cuba was a useful post for this mission because of the frequency of storms passing through the Gulf. (5) He looked everywhere he could to understand hurricanes: books, newspapers, the ocean levels, previous storm paths, and hurricanes themselves. (4) He kept notes on anything to help him in his quest; clouds, conversations with ship captains, telegraphs, and newspapers. (5)

Eventually, Fr. Viñes decided he needed to a network of observers to gather more data including sailors and reporters. The network reported to him by telegraph, and he shared the data he gathered with other weather watching organizations. (4)  Fr. Viñes took exhaustive measurements; ten observations daily including, though not limited to, barometer readings, evaporation levels, rainfall amount, wind speed,and cloud formation. (1)

However, over the next five years no seriously threatening hurricanes arrived. By then, he was ready. On September 8th, 1875, Fr. Viñes received telegraph reports through the Spanish navy that a hurricane had made landfall at Puerto Rico. (4, 5) He published a forecast in the newspaper and warned ships not to sail north or east out of Havana so they wouldn’t sail straight into a hurricane. (4) The only American ship that ignored the warning sailed into the hurricane and all the crew perished, though no Cuban passengers were aboard. (5)

In 1876, based solely on his own measurements, Fr. Viñes predicted an incoming hurricane two days before it made landfall. (5) This success gave Fr. Viñes the fame he needed to acquire a series of tours across the affected areas in Cuba, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico over the 1876-1877 winter. (5) His interviews with the victims and observation of the physical evidence afforded him enough information to publish his first book describing hurricanes. It was published in English as “Practical Hints in Regard to West Indian Hurricanes” by the US Army (3) While only fifteen pages long, it contains a wealth of information and practical advice regarding identification of an approaching hurricane and how to navigate away from it. (10) 

He also distilled his extensive knowledge of hurricane detection into a device known either as an ‘inner phase cyclonoscope’ or an ‘antilles cyclonoscope.’ which assists meteorologists in locating the eye of a hurricane (2, 4, 7) The cyclonoscope was somewhat like a slide rule and was composed of two cards. Based on cloud and wind observations at the meteorologist’s site, the inner card could be rotated and the direction of the hurricane’s center could be determined. (7, 11) This simple tool simplified his years of observation and experience into essentially a hurricane calculator.

Fr. Viñes started exploring the possibility of assembling a network of amateur storm contacts by telegraph to expand his data before the 1876 season had ended, enlisting the aid of the Spanish Navy’s observations through various contacts including Cuban railroad operators, US Army signal corps operators. (5) Fr. Viñes also contacted a Spanish Jesuit in charge of the Manila observatory and inspired him to start issuing hurricane warnings in the Philippines. (5) The Filipino contact network even outlasted and outperformed Fr. Viñes’ significant efforts. 

Fr. Viñes traveled to England in 1882 to acquire more sophisticated observation equipment and the head of the Jesuit Observatory at Stonyhurst, Stephen Perry, personally trained Fr. Viñes and calibrated the equipment. (5) Later that year, Fr. Viñes also observed the transit of Venus. (5)

After a tremendously destructive hurricane season in 1886, Fr. Viñes finally got his wish to have a warning network that stretched across the Caribbean. In 1887, the Cuban Chamber of Commerce pitched in, creating a telegraphic network which included Spanish, British, French, Venezuelan, and Dominican lands, among others. Additionally, they placed the entire network at Fr. Viñes’ disposal. (5) Telegraph, railroad, and steamship companies were willing to offer their service for free to assist his lifesaving ventures. (8) Fr. Viñes was able to use his telegraph network to send warnings out across the Caribbean when he found a storm was approaching. (7)

The US foremost expert on hurricanes, Everett Hayden, traveled to Cuba to learn from Fr. Viñes and Hayden later mentioned Fr. Viñes’ work several times in his book, ‘The Modern Law of Storms’ (5, 6) The ‘Law of Storms’ that preceded Hayden’s book, attempted to predict storm behaviour, including hurricanes, by using winds at sea level. (12) Fr. Viñes’ criticized this theory as far too simplistic in his final work: ‘Investigation of Cyclonic Circulation and the Transitory Movement of West Indian Hurricanes’. Rather than seeing the complex structure and variation in wind direction and speed at different altitudes, it assumes that the wind at sea level is indicative of the entire structure. Fr. Viñes’ theory includes wind and cloud throughout the cloud to create a three dimensional understanding of hurricane structure. (9) 

The 35 page ‘Investigation of Cyclonic Circulation and the Transitory Movement of West Indian Hurricanes’ was finished two days before he died and contained of Fr. Vines’ rules for predicting hurricanes. It noted intricacies such as how hurricane season operates on a a sort of mirrored schedule so the first week of June ramps up around the same rate as the end of October ramps down. (9) 

To pull a couple of examples, cirrus clouds were useful as a first indicator of a hurricane’s location because they “fired out from the center of the hurricane.” (2) The color and type of clouds also helped him determine where the hurricane was located. (5)

The most difficult piece to accurately predict was the “law of recurvature” which came about as a result of the general tendency of hurricanes to head west and then turn to the northeast after a period. Many hurricanes followed this rule, but a significant portion failed to follow this idea, with one actually turning south instead of north. (5, 6)

That being said, his theory was a tremendous leap forward for storm prediction . After his death and with the US occupation after the Spanish-American War, the Caribbean network of storm observers no longer answered to the head of the Belén College so the new director was unable to issue a hurricane warning for a 1900 cyclone. The storm made landfall in Galveston on September 8th as predicted by Fr. Viñes’ theories and because of the lack of warning, it became the deadliest hurricane in US history. (5)

Before Fr. Viñes, there was no way to forecasting hurricanes. Through careful observation and study he created a new field, enlisted the help of hundreds of others, and helped save thousands of lives.In addition to his two books, Fr. Viñes wrote various articles on the subject of hurricanes that illuminated hurricane structure and motion. (4) Fr. Viñes was so influential that for a while, Hurricanes were just ‘Viñesa’ followed by a number, in honor of his work. Sadly, this didn’t last and his name has fallen into unwarranted obscurity. (2) 

Works Referenced

  1. Father Benito Viñes: The 19th Century Life and Contributions of a Cuban Hurricane Observer and Scientist by Luis E. Ramos Guadalupe (review) https://muse.jhu.edu/article/640782 
  2. Father Hurricane: A genius of meteorology  https://www.miamiarch.org/CatholicDiocese.php?op=Article_131017125417303 
  3. The Legacy of Fr Benito Vines http://www.actforlibraries.org/the-legacy-of-fr-benito-vines/ 
  4. 140th Anniversary of first hurricane forecast https://noaahrd.wordpress.com/2015/09/15/140th-anniversary-of-first-hurricane-forecast/ 
  5. Viñes Martorell, Carlos Benito José https://www.encyclopedia.com/science/dictionaries-thesauruses-pictures-and-press-releases/vines-martorell-carlos-benito-jose 
  6. The Modern Law of Storms https://books.google.com/books?id=5BLkVqGRrg8C&pg=PA181&lpg=PA181&dq 
  7. The Hurricane Man in Havana https://www.irishtimes.com/news/the-hurricane-man-in-havana-1.112176 
  8. Hurricanes: A Reference Handbook https://books.google.com/books?id=aJz0y__JHsYC&pg=PA228&lpg=PA228&dq
  9. Investigation of Cyclonic Circulation and the Transitory Movement of West Indian Hurricanes https://books.google.com/books/about/Investigation_of_the_Cyclonic_Circulatio.html?id=Tt4lAAAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button#v=onepage&q&f=false 
  10. Practical Hints in Regard to West Indian Hurricanes https://books.google.com/books?id=F8oOAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false 
  11. The Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia https://books.google.com/books?id=oiFJAQAAMAAJ&pg=PA1423&lpg=PA1423&dq=
  12. The Law of Storms https://www.gutenberg.org/files/55774/55774-h/55774-h.htm 


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