Hurricane Beulah was the second tropical storm, second hurricane, and only major hurricane during the 1967 Atlantic hurricane season. It tracked through the Caribbean, struck the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico as a major hurricane, and moved west-northwestward into the Gulf of Mexico, briefly gaining Category 5 intensity. It was the strongest hurricane during the 1967 Atlantic hurricane season. The hurricane made landfall just north of the mouth of the Rio Grande as a Category 3 hurricane. It spawned 115 tornadoes across Texas, which established a new record for the highest amount of tornadoes produced by a tropical cyclone. Due to its slow movement over Texas, Beulah led to significant flooding. Throughout its path, at least 59 people were killed and total damage reached $234.6 million (1967 USD), of which $200 million occurred in the United States, $26.9 million occurred in Mexico, and $7.65 million occurred in the eastern Caribbean.
Meteorological history
On August 22, 1967, an ESSA-5 satellite image depicted an area of enhanced convection—shower and thunderstorm activity—east of the Western High Plateau in Cameroon over central Africa. Reaching the western slopes of the mountains two days later, the tropical wave became more coherent with clouds condensing along its axis. As it moved over west Africa, cyclonic rotation became apparent about above the surface. A research paper published in 1969 refers to the disturbance as a depression as it neared the west coast of Africa; however, this significantly differs from the official Atlantic hurricane database, which does not mention the system at that time, as a surface circulation likely did not exist. Regardless, the system emerged over the Atlantic Ocean around 12°N on August 28, as represented by barometric pressure falls in Dakar, Senegal. Once over water, the system interacted with the Intertropical Convergence Zone and continued westward along an undulating path with no further organization. It was not until a United States Navy weather reconnaissance plane flew into the disturbance on September 4, while it was located east of the Lesser Antilles, that signs of development were apparent. Corresponding observations from ships in the region on September 5 confirmed the existence of a 1010 mbar (hPa; ) low-pressure area. In light of this, the disturbance was classified as a tropical depression at 12:00 UTC that day, with its center situated roughly east-northeast of Barbados.
A slow-moving system, the depression steadily organized as it approached the Lesser Antilles. Observations from aircraft reconnaissance indicated that the system attained gale-force winds by 12:00 UTC on September 7, resulting in its upgrade to a tropical storm. It was also assigned the name Beulah, making it the second named storm of the 1967 season. Shortly after being named, Beulah clipped the southern coast of Martinique and entered the eastern Caribbean. Feeding off the warm waters of the Caribbean, the cyclone quickly strengthened and reached Category 1 hurricane intensity by 18:00 UTC on September 8. Rapid deepening ensued thereafter, with the storm's central pressure falling to 940 mbar (hPa; ) the following day, as it passed south of Puerto Rico. At this time, 1-minute sustained winds were estimated to be at least , ranking Beulah as a Category 4 hurricane on the Saffir–Simpson hurricane scale (SSHS). Upon reaching this strength, weather radar imagery from San Juan, Puerto Rico showed that Beulah featured a wide eye, surrounded by an intense eyewall about thick.
During the evening of September 9, Beulah turned westward as weak ridge developed over the Bahamas, between it and the newly formed Tropical Storm Doria. The powerful storm weakened somewhat as an eyewall replacement cycle began to take shape. During this phase, the inner-eye of Beulah contracted to roughly in diameter while a second eyewall spanned an area across. The smaller eye soon dissipated, and the larger one became the single, dominant feature by the morning of September 10. The completion of this process marked the first time that an eyewall replacement cycle was observed in its entirety. The aforementioned westward turn placed the Dominican Republic in the line of danger, an area still reeling from the devastating effects of Hurricane Inez just one year prior. However, the storm unexpectedly collapsed as it approached the Barahona Peninsula and struck the area as a greatly weakened, though still significant, Category 1 hurricane, with estimated winds of around 18:00 UTC on September 11.