The 2017 hurricane season!

The hurricane season of 2017 was very unusual when comparing the data and impacts of the hurricanes to past hurricane seasons. Not only were there more hurricanes than usual in 2017, they were also very strong and dangerous hurricanes and accumulated over 200 billion dollars in damage. The majority of this damage came from the three major hurricanes (Hurricane Harvey, Irma, and Maria) that occurred in 2017. The reason why this hurricane season was so unexpected was because the earlier calculations predicted that it should have been a relatively quiet hurricane season since water temperatures were cooler than normal. Since the 2017 hurricane season was expected to be relatively quiet, it caught many off guard when the surge of hurricanes occurred during September. This increased the total damages of the hurricanes because people in the targeted areas had less time to protect themselves from the damages caused by the many hurricanes. When examining the 2017 hurricane season, one must look at the factors that contributed to making it such a devastating hurricane season.

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One of the major factors that caused such severe hurricanes was the increase in climate change which has impacted almost every aspect of natural disasters. One aspect of hurricanes that climate change impacts is the thermal potential, which is the thermodynamic speed limit of hurricanes. This is determined by the difference in wind speeds from the surface of the water to 10 miles above. If these two places have similar wind speeds, it is more likely that the hurricane will continue to grow and stabilize, thus increasing the thermodynamic top speed of the hurricane. However, this isn’t the only way that climate change impacted the 2017 hurricane season. The increasing sea temperatures that have been caused by climate change was the key factor for the increase in hurricanes. Since hurricanes consist of and are built off of the water from the oceans, an increase in temperature would make the hurricanes more severe and they would be able to build up much more quickly than before. ​

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 Hurricane Harvey!

Before hitting land, hurricane Harvey started developing from a slow moving tropical storm in the gulf of mexico; 280 miles wide and a surge of 12 ft. Originating from a tropical wave in Africa. Hurricane Harvey first made contact in Texas on august 25th,2017. As it hit windward lands it slowed down into a tropical depression. However, it later reformed into a category 1 hurricane and grew into a category 4 hurricane with 130 mph winds.Later it was found that hurricane Harvey caused 125 billion dollars in damage (a crazy record for hurricane damage), impacted around 13 million people, and caused about 103 deaths. 
This graph shows the total area affected by Harvey:

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Hurricane Irma!

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Irma developed from a tropical wave in west Africa and rapidly developed into a category 5 storm with winds of 157 mph and highest winds of 177 mph, “Irma wrought catastrophe in Barbuda and parts of the U.S. and the British Virgin Islands. Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Haiti each experienced flooding and heavy damage in some areas, but the storm left much less destruction than expected.” states worldvision.org. This left  50 billion dollars in damage, 6.8 million people affected and 129 deaths.  The size of the storm was 425 miles and the surge was 1.6 meters before it landed in Florida as a category 4 and weakened from a tropical storm to a tropical depression. 
​Video below 

Hurricane Maria

​A month after Hurricane Harvey, Hurricane Maria hit numerous islands in the Caribbean at a size of 100 kt and a surge of 6-9 ft .It became a Category 3 storm Sept. 18 after doubling in strength in just 24 hours. Then it maintained its rapid growth, becoming a Category 5 storm Sept. 19 after making its way through the Leeward Islands.It smashed into the Caribbean island of Dominica, causing what Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit called “mind-boggling” devastation  in a region already devastated by Hurricane Irma. This resulted in 94.4 billion dollars in damage, 3.4 million people affected, and 46 recorded deaths. Maria was the strongest hurricane on record to make landfall in Dominica.
​Video below