Today’s entry: @brianmuddradio thanks for not hyping storms. We keep hearing storms are getting stronger but I don’t think that’s true. Wasn’t the strongest one in 1980?
Bottom Line: Yes, it was, and your point is well taken. There’s no doubt the general narrative advanced by many in the meteorological realm is that in the age of human induced climate change we have more storms and they’re progressively worse. As always there remain two sides to stories and one side to facts. The fact of the matter is that narrative is only partially true. There is no scientific evidence of more storms spinning up in recent years as a result of climate change man made or otherwise. There is evidence that once storms form, they’re more likely to intensify as a result of warmer temperatures. This is something I discussed with CSU’s lead researcher Dr. Phil Klotzbach recently – who confirmed the findings of my research. But even then, to your point, though we’re commonly told man made climate change is worse than ever, making hurricanes worse than ever, the strongest registered hurricane hasn’t happened recently.
The 1980 hurricane you referenced was the record setting Allen with top sustained winds of 190 mph. Not only was that 42 years ago, prior to the current climate cycle, it incidentally came during a period in which global temperatures had been dropping. Now, beyond Allen’s size let’s look at the rest of the strongest Atlantic hurricanes. There have been four hurricanes registering top winds of 185 mph. Those were:
- 1935: Labor Day hurricane
- 1988: Gilbert
- 2005: Wilma
- 2019: Dorian
Once again, in the 2nd tier there isn’t a hurricane which has occurred that’s reached a strength which hadn’t been monitored long ago. There have been three hurricanes in the third tier with top sustained winds of 180 mph:
- 1998: Mitch
- 2005: Rita
- 2017: Irma
Notably, in the third tier all were more recent with two being within the current elevated climate cycle. As for the fourth tier, there are ten hurricanes which have reached 175 mph:
- 1932: Cuba hurricane
- 1955: Janet
- 1969: Camille
- 1977: Anita
- 1979: David
- 1992: Andrew
- 2005: Katrina
- 2007: Dean
- 2007: Felix
- 2017: Maria
Once again, we see most of the storms of this magnitude happened prior to the current twenty-year cycle. This illustrates a few important points based on the illustrated facts:
- The strongest recorded Atlantic hurricane occurred decades prior to the current climate cycle
- In all other tiers there are hurricanes of similar strength in previous cycles
- There has been a total of 18 hurricanes with monitored winds of 175 mph or higher – all since 1932
- 8 of the 18 hurricanes have occurred within the current twenty-year cycle
So those are the facts as it pertains to the strongest monitored Atlantic hurricanes. It’s accurate to say there’s a disproportionate number of stronger hurricanes within the current twenty-year cycle. It’s inaccurate to suggest there’s anything exceptional about it in a historical context. Let’s hope it remains that way by the end of this season. And on that note – cheers to a wet weekend from a tropical system that’s little more than a rain event.
Each day I feature a listener question sent by one of these methods.
Email: brianmudd@iheartmedia.com
Gettr, Parler & Twitter: @brianmuddradio
iHeartRadio: Use the Talkback feature – the microphone button on our station’s page in the iHeart app.
Photo: Getty Images