from climaterealism
Author: Linny Luken
CBS News recently published an article titled “The Ten Deadliest Hurricanes in U.S. History,” which provides a factual discussion of the ten deadliest hurricanes that have made landfall in the United States. Refreshingly, CBS didn't try to attribute the deadly hurricane to climate change.
The article begins by citing a forecast from the Colorado State University Tropical Weather Program that the number of major hurricanes making landfall in the United States and Caribbean this season will be “well above average.” While some media outlets, including CBS, in other posts (by climate realism here ), try to shoehorn a human-caused climate change narrative into a story covering this hurricane season, but this one doesn’t. Instead, it simply lists the top ten storms with the highest death tolls, and the post itself is actually an attempt to undermine climate alarmist claims that recent storms are of “unprecedented” nature.
Of the ten storms listed:
- 4 occurred before 1900;
- The 1900 Galveston hurricane caused the highest death toll at 12,000;
- Only Hurricanes Katrina (1,200 deaths in Louisiana in 2005) and Maria (2,975 deaths in Puerto Rico in 2017) occurred in the past three decades.
However, with the death toll from the hurricane itself standing at 64, it remains an open question whether Maria should actually be on the list. climate realism For example, there has been criticism previously here and here , in which the authors looked at historical death patterns during and around hurricanes and attributed any excess deaths to the hurricanes – “estimates of how many people would have died if Hurricane Maria had not come to the island” . If attribution studies were conducted on every hurricane on the list, the death toll would likely be much higher as well.
Reports put Helene's current death toll at 238, but that number could rise as more wreckage is cleared and missing people are identified. As of this writing, there are no death statistics for Milton.
There is no clear pattern in these data for two main reasons.
First there is No A pattern of increasingly severe storms. Existing hurricane and tropical cyclone data simply do not show hurricanes becoming more intense, severe or frequent over time. climate realism Data has been covered dozens of times, sometimes for specific states. Even the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) agrees, noting in its 2021 AR6 Working Group report that determining past trends in tropical storm indicators is a “challenge.”
There have been no trends in global tropical cyclone frequency or global accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) since more accurate data collection began in the 1970s. (see picture below)
Although the coastal hurricane bullseye zone is now much more populated than in the past, most of the top 10 deadliest hurricanes occurred further back in the past. Why? U.S. evacuations and infrastructure are hardened against severe weather due to stronger building standards and technology due to improved early warning systems. Additionally, modern generators prevent many deaths caused by exposure to the elements, and emergency crews can quickly enter communities and restore power. These improvements would not be possible without fossil fuels and their byproducts, which climate alarmists seek to eliminate.
Every deadly storm is a tragedy, and it is as wrong to downplay the danger and devastation of tropical cyclones as it is to exaggerate them and try to link them to climate change. In this case, CBS offers a simple, factual account detailing the tragic history of severe hurricane landfalls in the United States and its territories. Bravo, CBS. See if you can follow up on this by sticking to the facts about severe weather in the future.
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