Three main factors converge to intensify hurricanes. The first is that as the world in general warms, so too do the oceans. Water evaporating off the surface rises, releasing heat that fuels the developing hurricane. The warmer a patch of ocean water is, the more energy a cyclone has to exploit. If a hurricane like … Read more
Ocean temperatures hit a record high in February, with the average global sea surface temperature at 21.06 degrees Celsius (69.91 degrees Fahrenheit), the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) said on Thursday. February’s average sea surface temperature surpassed the previous record of 20.98 C (69.77 F) set in August 2023, in a dataset that goes … Read more
Hurricanes are growing with such intensity and power due to climate change that a peer-reviewed study argues we need a new category to classify these worst-of-the-worst storms. Currently, hurricanes are categorized on the Saffir-Simpson scale, developed more than 50 years ago, which slots storms into five categories, Category 1 being the weakest and Category 5 … Read more
As Hurricane Larry curved north in the Atlantic in 2021, sparing the eastern seaboard of the United States, a special instrument was waiting for it on the coast of Newfoundland. Because hurricanes feed on warm ocean water, scientists wondered whether such a storm could pick up microplastics from the sea surface and deposit them when … Read more
