Oddball Hurricane Pablo developed farther east than any Atlantic tropical cyclone on record

Did you know there was a hurricane in the Atlantic on Sunday? If you blinked, you probably missed it. But scientists will be talking about Pablo for a long time.

The storm developed farther east than any hurricane on record in the North Atlantic Ocean Basin, blossoming over waters typically considered too cold to support such storms.

Pablo spun up in a rather unusual way, too. This time of year, we generally don’t see tropical cyclones (a term that encompasses tropical storms and hurricanes) that originate from tropical waves off the coast of Africa. Instead, most October cyclones are either home grown — developing in the Gulf of Mexico, or over the Gulf Stream — or stirred up with a bit of help from a not-tropical disturbance.