Climate Change Is Making Hurricanes More Dangerous

By Ella Kang

A hurricane, also called a tropical cyclone, is a type of storm that speedily rotates with a low-pressure center, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, tough winds, and thunderstorms that cause heavy rains and squalls. Hurricanes are one of the most violent natural disasters and each intensity of their sustained winds is classified under the Saffir-Simpson hurricane wind scale. However, satellite imagery of the past 4 decades confirmed that hurricanes are heavily impacted by climate change, increasing the chances of reaching Category 3 or higher.

In the analysis done by a group of researchers from Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology (OIST) Graduate University, it was demonstrated that global warming is increasing the chances of hurricanes developing into a major Category 3 or higher, with sustained winds greater than 110 miles an hour, by about 8% a decade. The study examined hurricanes from all over the world so that a lot more data is allowed, but natural variability or other factors that can impact storm intensity and warming are not included. Moreover, the satellite images dating from 1979 to 2017 showed the hurricanes gradually becoming stronger worldwide, mainly because of the warmer water. As warmer water makes hurricanes carry more moisture, which then allows them to remain strong after hitting the ground, there’s a lot of energy involved that fuels the storms for a longer amount of time.

More specifically, the scientists tested the relation between warmer sea surface temperature and slower weakening past landfall of hurricanes with computer simulations of 4 hurricanes in different temperatures of the sea surface. They then observed that the intensity of landfall didn’t matter; hurricanes that formed over warmer waters took a lot more to lower the strength. However, by using further simulations, the team concluded that “stored moisture” was the key point in this problem. Because hurricanes are able to carry a stock of moisture that acts as their fuel, they weaken very slowly even after the landfall when there’s no more access to seawater. Unfortunately, this means that as the Earth continues to warm in the future, destructive hurricanes will become more and more unavoidable.

It is evident that climate change will play a long-term role in shaping natural disasters like hurricanes, so it is imperative for us to plan ahead on how to prevent the warming and how to minimize the impacts of major storms.

Works Cited

• https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/11/201111122826.htm

• https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/18/climate/climate-changes-hurricane-intensity.html

• https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2867-7.epdf?sharing_token=KkjVMTYjwrV1lbzA76ZF2tRgN0jAjWel9jnR3ZoTv0NzEY9D1JrmvVrrZAzzDtl2CDVtbqbizkBOTB6OLMXtO01PScngL9kZ0MbJBO2NxiMB0ourAAx5xtu1Rnv6tdEh-oVU-mq3uABTCjpd3LBnVEmZiSVhfOW_YFqiwkhrV6yBvepaPmDOOv3vFeEXaasFneGeZZZ4AM_TeoSUGJqvKg%3D%3D&tracking_referrer=www.bbc.com

Cover Image of Hurricane Florence taken from the International Space Station in September 2018.