On September 5, another tropical wave entered the eastern Atlantic. It moved west-northwest and developed fairly quickly as it passed over Cabo Verde. In fact, it was still bringing rain to the westernmost islands of Cabo Verde when it was classified Tropical Depression Fourteen during the morning of September 7. Not long after that, it was upgraded to Tropical Storm Margot.
Margot faced a mixed-bag of conditions. It was moving over fairly warm ocean waters and faced only moderate wind shear. However, it was surrounded by a fairly dry environment, so it took time for the storm to develop deep convection. On September 8, the center became exposed to the southwest of the strongest thunderstorms. Nevertheless, Margot eventually managed to organize and began gradually strengthening on September 9. A more substantial inner core appeared the next day as the storm turned toward the north, following a weakness in the subtropical ridge.
By September 11, Margot was a well-organized storm with a partial eye and impressive outflow to the north. This brought it to hurricane strength. Margot had its ups and downs over the next couple of days as it chugged northward, with some dry air in the circulation but an inner core and eye occasionally visible on satellite imagery. The net effect of all this was a little more gradual intensification. Margot reached a peak intensity as a high-end category 1 hurricane with 90 mph winds and a central pressure of 970 mb on September 13.
After that point, the storm's core became a little more diffuse, but its windfield expanded as it gained latitude. On September 14, Margot turned right in the face of a ridge blocking its path, and started a slow clockwise loop west of the Azores. During the loop, the storm underwent a gradual decay as dry air eroded its thunderstorm activity. It weakened to a tropical storm on the 15th and lost nearly all convection by early on September 17. At that time, it became post-tropical.
The above image shows Margot at a hurricane on September 12.
Margot's only land impacts as a tropical cyclone were to Cabo Verde right after its formation as a tropical depression on September 7.
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