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Climate Change Drives Bigger, Wetter Storms -- Storms Like Florence (npr.org)
Rebecca Hersher, reporting for NPR: Hurricane Florence is moving relentlessly toward the Southeastern U.S. It's a large, powerful cyclone that will likely bring storm surge and high winds to coastal communities. But climate scientists say one of the biggest threats posed by Florence is rain. "Freshwater flooding poses the greatest risk to life," explains James Kossin, an atmospheric scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of Wisconsin, Madison. And Florence could cause extensive freshwater flooding for two reasons. First, Florence is moving slowly, and could all but stop when it reaches land. "The storm could be over North Carolina and traveling incredibly slowly -- on the order of just a few miles per hour," explains Kossin, who says an official from the city of Charlotte, N.C., contacted him about rainfall projections for that city.
If Florence stalls over the Southeast, it would be reminiscent of Hurricane Harvey, which spent days dumping rain on the Houston region last year. Some areas ended up with more than 60 inches, a catastrophic amount of water that shut down the entire region and resulted in at least 93 deaths. Slow-moving storms like Harvey are getting more common. A study published earlier this year by Kossin found that tropical cyclones around the world have slowed down 10 percent in the last 70 years. "We're seeing that in every ocean basin except the northern Indian Ocean," says Kossin, possibly because climate change is causing the wind currents that hurricanes ride to slow down. If Florence slows down and stalls when it hits land, it will the latest example of that trend. Kevin Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., says global warming also affects the size and intensity of storms like Florence.
If Florence stalls over the Southeast, it would be reminiscent of Hurricane Harvey, which spent days dumping rain on the Houston region last year. Some areas ended up with more than 60 inches, a catastrophic amount of water that shut down the entire region and resulted in at least 93 deaths. Slow-moving storms like Harvey are getting more common. A study published earlier this year by Kossin found that tropical cyclones around the world have slowed down 10 percent in the last 70 years. "We're seeing that in every ocean basin except the northern Indian Ocean," says Kossin, possibly because climate change is causing the wind currents that hurricanes ride to slow down. If Florence slows down and stalls when it hits land, it will the latest example of that trend. Kevin Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo., says global warming also affects the size and intensity of storms like Florence.
Weatherbug was pretty careful not to make the leap that Florence is a result of climate change. They had an article speculating that the reason Florence became so strong is the result of a Bermuda high which is in an unusual position for the year. The article's author felts that the blocking high was keeping Florence over warmer water so it could strengthen. Typically September hurricanes turn back out to sea.
The over 60" of rainfall number sounds impressive, but it is deceptive. The gauges with over 51 inches were uncalibrated. The calibrated gauges like Cedar Bayou recorded less (that one is the highest official total).
No doubt a destructive storm but it is not clear of any connection to global warming since total cyclonic energy and total rainfall have been less overall. It takes decades to get a pattern for climate and using one or two storms to make a point is also deceptive.
And no matter if it's well supported, the politics of the rightwing does not allow AGW to be real. So lots of places won't dare to mention climate change as being the cause of ANYTHING, because the only things AGW deniers will allow climate to do is "change" in such a way that we don't do it. It sure as shit isn't allowed to DO anything. Just change.
I believe there was a paper that said climate change could result in hurricanes moving slower. However, it is important to note that, as per Wikipedia, out on the most severe storms only 2 are from this century. In almost every metric the past century is worst then this one. If hurricanes are getting progressively worst you would think that records would be consistently broken.
The only area in witch modern storms win is in monetary damage caused which is obvious when you realize how many more people live in south Flordia when compared to 50 years ago.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Atlantic_hurricane_records