After this low-level exploration, the plane climbed to 29,500 feet, completing a spiral sounding in the eye. At this elevation or slightly lower, a complete navigation of the storm area was made, with dropsondes being released in strategic quarters, pressure and temperature gradients being measured along the track of the plane. There were two outstanding things observed during this flight at high levels: first, the sheer beauty of the storm itself, which could be viewed in excellent perspective, insofar as the cloud forms were geared to the wind circulations over hundreds of miles surrounding the eye. The only obstructions to vision at this elevation were the tall cloud walls which rose from the northern side of the eye. The second was a strong cyclonic circulation near thirty thousand feet over the eye itself which was surprising. Most theorists had figured that the cyclonic circulation would cease at high altitudes and possibly at very high levels become anticyclonic. Simpson continued: “By the time the plane had returned to Bermuda it was evident that Dolly was bearing down upon the island itself and that everything had to be evacuated. All of the planes were flown out to the mainland and the buildings battened down for the big blow. I spent most of the time in the weather station with my eyes glued to the radar scope. As the storm approached, and the winds rose, one rain band after another passed over the station, each with evidence of a little more curvature than the preceding band. “Finally, the scope indicated a circle with a five-mile area free of any radar echoes. It was bearing down directly upon Kindley Field. Oddly enough the pressure had not begun to fall and the wind was holding steady. Another odd thing was that during the reconnaissance the eye had been twenty-five miles in diameter. However, this eye was only four to five miles in diameter. The eye arrived, the rain stopped and then resumed as the eye passed over the station, yet the pressure only leveled off briefly and the wind only subsided slightly without shifting. We had been tricked! This was not the real McCoy, it was a false eye. Subsequently, two other false eyes appeared on the radar scope and we had about decided that the storm had no organized central circulation left when the real thing finally showed up on the scope, still twenty-five miles in diameter.”