I remember Hurricane Opal. It started in just about the same area. Everyone sort of dismissed it but once it got into the Gulf it rapidly increased until it was a category 4.
Now I know the professional hurricane trackers know all this but they have been caught by surprise before.
Opal? How about Mitch in 1998? Came up in the same area, and before you could blink; it was a Cat 5 with winds of 185-190 MPH...wound up killing 22,000 people. Wither Nate? We’ll see.
I think Opal was the one to rip through the motel at the 98 cut.
Opal was, what,1979? Predictive technology, though not perfect, has certainly changed since then.