WILMA / Here we go again

Hurricane Wilma became the fiercest Atlantic hurricane ever seen as it churned toward western Cuba and Mexico's Yucatan peninsula on Wednesday, and threatened densely populated Florida after having already killed 10 people in Haiti.

The season's record-tying 21st storm, fueled by the warm waters of the northwest Caribbean Sea, intensified with unexpected and unprecedented speed into a Category 5 hurricane, the top rank on the five-step scale of hurricane intensity.

A U.S. Air Force reconnaissance plane measured maximum sustained winds of 175 mph, with higher gusts, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.

The plane also recorded a minimum pressure of 882 millibars, the lowest value ever observed in the Atlantic basin. The previous record was for Hurricane Gilbert at 888 millibars, which hit Mexico in 1988. That meant Wilma was stronger than any storm on record, including both Katrina, which devastated New Orleans in late August, and Rita, which hit the Texas-Louisiana coast in September.