I believe it is most definitely the strongest Pacific storm...but not necessarily the strongest world-wide.
I believe there have been hurricanes in the Atlantic with sustained winds that topped 200 mph.
For example, I believe hurricane Wilma, that hit Florida in 2005, had winds at or near 209 MPH. One well known scientist, Dr. Eric Uhlhorn of NOAA’s Hurricane Research Division, presented a scholarly paper in 2012 where he posited this.
But as with all of these “top sustained winds,” it is only an estimate.
I also believe that hurricane Allen from 1980, had sustained winds over 200 MPH, though the official “estimate,” was 190 MPH.
It hard to tell because the hurricane hunter aircraft measure wind at altitude and then based on some pretty deep mathematical formulas, they estimate the ground winds. The best place to measure the ground winds is, of course, at the surface, and those are hard to come by given the obvious issues with measuring a 200 MPH wind at the place it is happening.
But there is no doubt at all that this hurricane is the strongest Pcific Storm, and it is not done yet. It may yet prove to be undoubtedly the strongest storm of all time.
Which ones?
Or it may drop down to a Cat 3 or lower by the time it makes landfall. There is really no way to tell.
Only Algore can predict the future.
Sorry for the dumb first post. None of these reports show recorded wind speeds at 200 mpg.
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/key/?n=wilma
https://coast.noaa.gov/hes/images/pdf/HURR_ALLEN80_MET_DATA.pdf
Also, we have only been measuring hurricane strength with any degree of accuracy for the past 100 years or so, so “of all time” doesn’t count the Galveston Hurricane of 1900 or any hurricanes before that.
Eastern Pacific, not Western.
I want to correct a few things here in your post:
It's the strongest in the NHC AOR. The lowest pressure was Wilma at 882...this was 880....with a real possibility it was well into the 870s since recon left while it was still deepening.
All the Atlantic storms with winds of 200 are estimates and will likely be lowered when they are reviewed by the re-analy project.
Wilma had max winds of 185...but that was when she was in the NW Caribbean. The max winds seen in Fl were gusts to about 120 kts. There are ALWAYS winds of 180-200 mph in hurricanes...but they are related to tornadoes and not the storm gradient itself. With the pressure gradient of Wilma at the time of landfall, it would be impossible to produce straight-line winds of 200 mph.
Hurricane Allen's max winds were about 185-190....which is also probably too high given the lowest pressure (899) and the very broad pressure gradient.
Hurricane hunters do not rely on those calculations any longer. They rely on SFMR to get true sea surface winds. SFMR is an instrument that is like a cops's radar gun...except its measuring the sea foam and spray. It's pretty accurate.