Hurricane Milton Might Have Been a Category 2 Storm Without Climate Change
A rapid scientific analysis found that fossil-fuel and other greenhouse gas pollution increased the likelihood of the storm’s high winds and heavy rains.
Destroyed homes after Hurricane Milton in St. Pete Beach, Florida, on Oct. 10.
Photographer: Tristan Wheelock/BloombergGreenhouse gas pollution is making hurricanes more powerful, and Hurricane Milton is no exception, according to an overnight analysis by the climate science group World Weather Attribution. It suggests that a day’s worth of rainfall from a storm of Milton’s scale is 20% to 30% more intense and twice as likely as it would have been in a world without climate change. The planet is now 1.3C hotter than it was before industrialization.
Using a climate model to replicate similar storms, the team also found that maximum wind speeds, in a hotter world, are about 10% stronger than they would have been otherwise.