1932 Abaco hurricane

In late August and early September, 1932, a potent Atlantic hurricane—retroactively rated Category 5 on the modern Saffir–Simpson scale—impacted portions of the Lucayan Archipelago and the East Coast of the United States, inflicting locally severe damage. It was known as the Great Abaco hurricane or the 1932 Bahamas hurricane, after the site of its worst effects, which it hit at peak intensity. Though large and powerful, it impacted few areas other than islands. The fourth tropical storm and third hurricane of the 1932 Atlantic hurricane season, it belonged to a pair of Category 5 storms in the Atlantic Ocean that year, the other happening in November.

The cyclone formed north of the Virgin Islands on August 30, over the next three days gradually strengthening. Heading west-northwest, it became a hurricane on September 2 and a strong hurricane a day later. On September 4 it became a major hurricane—Category 3 or stronger—and on September 5 peaked with winds of 160 mph (260 km/h), passing over the northern Bahamas on the latter date. Its eye traversed the Abaco Islands, attended by catastrophic winds and storm surge that killed 18 people. One of four Category 5 storms to hit the Bahamas on record, it was also the first of two such to strike the Abaco Islands, the other being 2019's Dorian.

Within a day of landfall it turned northward and then northeastward, heading seaward while a powerful hurricane. By September 8 the storm weakened to below Category 3 status, never making landfall on the contiguous United States. Nevertheless, its effects were felt on the East Coast of the United States, primarily in the northeastern part of the country, including 56-mile-per-hour (90 km/h) winds offshore of New England, doing mostly minor—but occasionally significant—damage. On September 9 it lost tropical features and continued a week, brushing the Maritimes. In Atlantic Canada it claimed 14–15 lives, widely dispersing impacts, and gradually turned eastward near Iceland, eventually passing north of the Scandinavian Peninsula and ending near the Russian SFSR of the Soviet Union on September 17.