edHelper.com The 1930's Natural Disasters

The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938

---

The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938
Reading Level

	edHelper's suggested reading level:	grades 7 to 9
	Flesch-Kincaid grade level:	7.27

Vocabulary

	challenging words:		outlying, forecasters, offshore, landfall, killing, surge, tragic, stately, stranded, public, inland, death, general, billion, force, coast
	content words:		Weather Bureau, New England, Long Island Express, Long Island, New York, Atlantic Ocean, Suffolk County, Long Island Sound, Rhode Island, Westhampton Beach

---

Print The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938

Print The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938  (font options, pick words for additional puzzles, and more)

Quickly Print - PDF format

	Quickly Print: PDF (2 columns per page)
	Quickly Print: PDF (full page)

Quickly Print - HTML format

Quickly Print: HTML

Proofreading Activity

Print a proofreading activity

---

Feedback on The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938

Leave your feedback on The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938  (use this link if you found an error in the story)

---

The Long Island Express: The New England Hurricane of 1938 By Joyce Furstenau

---

¹     The Weather Bureau experts and the general public never saw it coming. The greatest weather disaster ever to hit New England struck at around 3:30 P.M. on September 21, 1938. It was a category three hurricane. A category three hurricane has wind speeds between 111 and 130 mph. This hurricane was later nicknamed The Long Island Express because of the force with which it destroyed the Long Island, New York communities.
 
²     Weather satellites, weather radar, and offshore weather buoys did not exist in 1938. Storms were tracked by radio signals. The storm was first located over the Atlantic Ocean east of the New England coastline. A young research forecaster thought the storm's path would approach the Northeast coast. His senior forecasters overruled him. Hurricanes rarely travel that far over the colder Atlantic Ocean, but this one traveled so rapidly, it was too late for a warning. The hurricane made landfall in Suffolk County on Long Island at 3:30 P.M. From there, it traveled across Long Island Sound to Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Vermont, and finally into Canada. It was moving at speeds of over 60 mph. A storm surge hit Long Island a few hours after the hurricane. This was what did the most damage. It hit Long Island with two-story tall waves. It wiped out Westhampton Beach, killing 29 people.
 
³     When the storm surge hit Rhode Island, it killed 100 people. One of the most tragic stories from Rhode Island was the death of seven children who had abandoned their school bus during the storm. They thought they would be safer by holding hands and trying to walk to safety. The children were washed away.

Paragraphs 4 to 7:
For the complete story with questions: click here for printable

---

Weekly Reading Books

Create Weekly Reading Books Prepare for an entire week at once!

---

The 1930's

The 1930's

---

Natural Disasters

Natural Disasters

---

More Lessons

Weather

High School Reading Comprehensions and High School Reading Lessons

---

Science

Science

Careers in Science         Caring for Earth         Clouds         Dinosaurs         Earth's Land         Earth         Earthquakes         Electricity         Energy         Erosion         Food Pyramid         Food Webs and Food Chain         Forces and Motion         Fossils         Health and Nutrition         How Things Work         Landforms         Life Science         Light

Magnets         Matter         Natural Disasters         Photosynthesis         Plant and Animal Cells         Plants         Rocks and Minerals         Science Process Skills         Seasons         Simple Machines         Solar System         Sound         Space and Stars         Tsunami         Volcanoes         Water Cycle         Water         Weather

---

United States

United States

American Government         Black History and Blacks in U.S. History         Children in History         Government Careers         Hispanic Heritage         How Can I Help?

Immigration         National Parks and Monuments         Native Americans         Presidents of the United States         Women's History

---

United States History

A Nation Divided (1840-1861)         A New Nation (1776-1830)         After the Civil War (1865-1870)         American Revolution         Cold War (1947-1991)         Colonial America (1492-1776)         Lewis and Clark (1804-1806)         Spanish American War (1898)         The 1890's         The 1900's         The 1910's         The 1920's         The 1930's         The 1940's

The 1950's         The 1960's         The 1970's         The 1980's         The 1990's         The 2000's         The Civil War (1861-1865)         The Great Depression (1929-1945)         The United States Grows (1865-1900)         The War of 1812         Wild, Wild West         World War I (1914-1918)         World War II

---

50 States

Fifty States Theme Unit

---

Document Based Activities

Document Based Activities

---

More Activities, Lesson Plans, and Worksheets

Back to School Graphic Organizers Alphabet Worksheets Sight Words Math Worksheets Mazes 50 States Monthly Themes January February March April May June July August September October November December

Fractions Place Value Time and Calendar Money Earth Day Solar System Analogies Nouns Following Directions Listening Capitalization Cursive Writing Patterns and Sequencing Dinosaurs All About Me Kindergarten First Grade Second Grade Third Grade Fourth Grade Fifth Grade Sixth Grade

Multiplication Division Main Idea Cause and Effect Measurement Decimals Rounding Order of Operations Verbs Community Helpers Adjectives Plants Grammar Addition and Subtraction Contractions Bulletin Board Ideas Word Searches Crossword Puzzles Printable Puzzles Reading Comprehension Reading Skills English Language Arts

Copyright © 2011 edHelper