Anything below 29" would pretty much put you in a hurricane! Some of the strongest hurricanes ever, in the history of the US had barometric pressure as high as 28.47" Weak hurricanes have barometric pressures as high as 29.25" Based on this information I can only come up with two conclusions. My source was the national hurricane center www.noaa.gov
The first theory is whomever came up with those pressures for good hunting was either on top of a very tall mountain.
My 2nd theory is they were just writing an article and needed to sound like they knew something.
Yet there is another possibility...You might not remember the article very well, and misquoted.