With hurricanes increasing drastically in their intensity, scientists are beginning to debate if further categories need to be added to the current rating system. With 5 storms exceeding wind speeds of 192mph (all of which occurred since 2013), there is clear evidence for the change in both intensity and frequency of hurricanes in recent years. This is occurring as human activities increase greenhouse gas emissions, therefore warming the Earth’s atmosphere and creating the perfect conditions for the formation of tropical storms.
The danger these more frequent hurricanes bring is being heightened by the increased heat of the planet causing more evaporation, in turn creating more intense rainfall; this greatly increases risk of fl ooding. Currently, the Saffir-Simpson scale is used to determine the severity of a hurricane. Each storm is given a category from 1-5 with 5 being the strongest and deemed to have the potential to cause ‘catastrophic damage’.
These storms have wind speeds of over 156mph with no upper limit. The proposed idea is that this category should be capped at 192mph with any storm exceeding this being classed as a Category 6 hurricane. Scientist at Lawrence Berkely National Laboratory, Michael Wehner, stated that a storm at this speed would be “probably faster than most Ferraris, it’s hard to even imagine”.
The most prominent example of a hurricane that reached this wind speed is Typhoon Haiyan which hit the Philippines in 2019 bringing wind speeds of 195mph. This hurricane had massive impacts with 90% of the city of Tacloban being destroyed and killing over 8,000 people. Extreme storms like Haiyan are becoming more frequent, this is causing the current scoring system to become outdated as it doesn’t differentiate the devastating impacts of those with exceptionally high wind speeds.
It is predicted that at the current rate of emissions, global temperatures will continue to rise. This will further increase the risk of more frequent and intense hurricanes. Our current methods and ways of rating hurricanes will need to develop as the world and its weather changes.