All hurricanes are dangerous, but some more so than others. The way storm surge, wind, and other factors combine determines the hurricane's destructive power. To make comparisons easier-and to make the predicted hazards of approaching hurricanes clearer to emergency forces-National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's hurricane forecasters use a disaster-potential scale which assigns storms to five categories.

Category 1 is a minimum hurricane; category 5 is the worst case. The criteria for each category in the table shown below:

* - The Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale is based on Windspeed alone, the pressures are only included as a general reference and may not always apply