The Black Sea is an inland Mediterranean sea covering over 165,000 square miles. The countries that border the ocean are Bulgaria, Georgia, Russia, Ukraine, Romania and Turkey. The Turkish Straits drains the sea while the Danube, Don, and Dneiper rivers feed the sea.
The deadly storm was named Bettina by European meteorologists. The storm first developed in the Adriatic Sea, passed over Greece, and killed people on a cargo ship off the coast of the Greek island of Lesbos.
The storm intensified over the Black Sea on Sunday, generating high seas, heavy rainfall, and snowfall into Monday. Besides a death in Lesbos, people were killed in Russia and Ukraine (Crimea). Ukraine, Romania, Moldova, Bulgaria, Serbia, and the Moscow region endured heavy snowfall and blizzard conditions.
Mark Sumner wrote on the implications of the storm on the Ukraine war. Russian mines they placed in the Black Sea have been tossed around, and no one knows if they are even still in the waters off Odesa, Ukraine. Kos also posted on the storm.
The storm followed a prior storm that hit Turkey's coast, killed "nine people, sank a cargo ship, and broke another ship in two, the AP reported.
As the storm entered the Black Sea on Sunday, its pressure had dropped as low as 968 millibars — which is comparable to a Category 2 or 3 hurricane. Its pressure dropped about 20 millibars from the previous day, nearly meeting the meteorological criteria for a “bomb cyclone,” which is a 24-millibar drop in 24 hours. Typically, the lower the pressure, the stronger the storm.
Meteorologists said there was a chance the storm’s low pressure reading would set a record.