Eastern Pacific records its most energetic hurricane season

This map tracks all of the major 2018 tropical storms that trekked across the Eastern Pacific toward North America’s West Coast. Their strength is marked by their color, from darker blue (lowest speed) to yellow and red (increasingly strong hurricanes). Image courtesy of Franco Leymas/Wikimedia.

As of 22 October 2018, the eastern Pacific Ocean recorded its most energetic cyclone season on record. That assessment comes from Phil Klotzbach, now at Colorado State University in Fort Collins. There, he analyzes tropical storms and hurricanes, calculating how much energy they release. That energy is expressed as a numerical score known as Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE). These scores have been kept since around 1970.

Hawai‘i may find itself pummeled by hurricanes even more in coming years. The reason is climate change, according to scientists at the Department of Atmospheric Sciences (ATMO) and the International Pacific Research Center (IPRC). Professor Bin Wang warns that his team’s models indicate “a substantial increase in the likelihood of tropical cyclone frequency … with a northwestward shifting of the tropical cyclone track.” That would put the southern Hawaiian islands directly in a path that future storms are more likely to take.

Read more about it in the young reader-friendly Science News for Students.