Publication Date October 20, 2015 | Washington Post

El Niño fueling most extreme tropical cyclone season on record in Northern Hemisphere

Kiribati
Hurricane Olaf in the central Pacific Ocean, October 20, 2015. Image: NOAA
Hurricane Olaf in the central Pacific Ocean, October 20, 2015. Image: NOAA

NOAA’s Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL) has concluded the activity we’re observing this year may be a harbinger of the future. “There are better than even odds that the numbers of very intense (category 4 and 5) hurricanes will increase by a substantial fraction in some basins [in the coming century],” it wrote in a synthesis of projected impacts of warming on hurricane activity, updated Sept. 30