Global Warming Made Hurricane Melissa More Damaging, Researchers Say

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By Sachi Kitajima Mulkey, The New York Times. 

Excerpt: Hurricane Melissa’s path through the Caribbean last month was made more violent by climate change, according to a scientific analysis released Thursday. Researchers from the group World Weather Attribution found that the storm had 7 percent stronger wind speeds than a similar one in a world that has not been warmed by the burning of fossil fuels. They also found the rate of rainfall inside the eyewall of the storm was 16 percent more intense. Melissa made landfall as a Category 5 storm in Jamaica on Oct. 28 with wind speeds of 185 miles per hour, collapsing buildings and knocking out internet to most of the island. It continued on to Cuba as a Category 3 storm, forcing hundreds to evacuate, and pummeled Haiti with catastrophic flooding. Dozens of people in hard-hit areas have died. Even a small increase in wind speed can cause substantial damage, said Friederike Otto, one of the group’s founders and a climatologist at Imperial College London. While the economic toll of Melissa is still unfolding, Dr. Otto estimated that the increase in wind speed may have added more than one billion dollars in additional damages...,” she said. ...The frequency of hurricanes may actually be decreasing as the climate warms, according to a 2022 study. But those that do form are more likely to become extreme, according to the United Nations’ leading climate report.... 

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