Cat 4 Hurricane Trends
By Paul Homewood
Are Category 4 and 5 hurricanes becoming more frequent?
The only long term dataset we have is for US landfalling hurricanes, which dates back to 1851. Some of the earlier data is still uncertain, but the record is reasonably reliable since around 1880.
Below is a chart of the number of hurricanes which made landfall at Cat 4 or 5:
https://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/hurdat/All_U.S._Hurricanes.html
The evidence is clear. Whilst the last few years have been busy as far as these hurricanes are concerned, similar numbers occurred in the 1940s and 50s. We also need to view recent hurricane activity in the light of the complete absence of Cat 4 and 5s between 2004 and 2017.
The 30-year average gives a much more complete overall view, and this too confirms that these strongest hurricanes are not becoming more common.
It is also worth considering the ACE data. This again makes it clear that hurricanes worldwide have not become more powerful during the satellite era.
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Hurricanes are weather events. They occur when specific conditions exist.
Even if the frequency goes up, it is not evidence for anything. Simply conditions were met more frequently.
The most common howling at the moon is over water temperatures in the Atlantic/Caribbean/Gulf from 10°N to 35°N. The secret is that water temperatures there from summer to late fall are ALWAYS hot enough to support storms.
Water temperature is NOT A LIMITING FACTOR.
As with all climate change attribution, demand to know the mechanism.
“Yep, it’s climate change!” is not enough.
But unfortunately “climate change” has become in the mass media the universal cause of all bad weather events, while any good ones are dismissed as a “blip”. Our children are also being taught this at school by a climate change obsessed generation of teachers. This is what leads to teenagers being convinced that the world is going to end in some sort of apocalypse before they become full adults. It’s child abuse but the teachers get away with it because no reporter in the mass media has the whits or guts to challenge it.
There is a “Woodward and Bernstein’ opportunity of fame for the first team of reporters to have the courage to go against the global warming narrative, but none of those I’ve approached have the courage.
The evening Weather reports on the TV channels in Australia are all** full on about the 2 cyclones (hurricanes) affecting Australia at present. One a category 2 is 600 km. off the NW coast of WA and heading away. The other is off the east coast heading south, and is expected to hit Norfolk Island as a category 2 or maybe 3 (Norfolk Island is a small subtropical island approximately 1,600 km north-east of Sydney and 1,100 km north-west of Auckland).
** possibly also on the ABC channels but I, like the vast majority, don’t watch those.
Interesting factoid!
Please N.B that info on hurricanes hitting the US mainland could as well have read cat4/5 hurricanes hitting White People.
The frequency of ALL. North Atlantic hurricanes of cat 4/5 has about doubled since 1970.
Apparently hurricanes that don’t affect Americans don’t really count 😁
If true, this is shocking.
Can you provide some historical data to show this and rdisprove
the graphs shown above by Paul
Since the 1980s, the hurricane record has shown a more active period in the North Atlantic Ocean. On average, there have been more storms, stronger hurricanes, and an increase in hurricanes that rapidly intensify. Thus far, most of these increases are from natural climate variations. However, one recent study suggests that the latest increase in the proportion of North Atlantic hurricanes undergoing rapid intensification is a bit too large to be explained by natural variability alone. This could be the beginning of detecting the impact of climate change on hurricanes, the paper states. In contrast, the frequency of hurricanes making U.S. landfall (a subset of North Atlantic hurricanes) has not increased since 1900, despite significant global warming and the heating of the tropical Atlantic Ocean.
https://climate.nasa.gov/news/3184/a-force-of-nature-hurricanes-in-a-changing-climate/
I cannot imagine that NASA is racist. One should also, in the interest of science and integrity, look at both sides of an argument for a more impartial view and see who is lying by omission.
Thank you, I will look into this more. But the information you sent relates to studies and computer forecasts, I see no data that confirms what you wrote. Only a supposition.
“However, one recent study suggests that the latest increase in the proportion of North Atlantic hurricanes undergoing rapid intensification is a bit too large to be explained by natural variability alone.”
NASA may not be racist, but they are stupid.
Not necessarily stupid, just toeing the AGW line to keep the funds going
As requested, a graph representing data:
https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-tropical-cyclone-activity#:~:text=Key%20Points%201%20Since%201878%2C%20about%20six%20to,the%20mid-1990s%20%28see%20Figure%202%29.%20…%20More%20items
Notice the trend from the 1980s. But when one looks further back into the past, and makes an adjustment for missing data, the trend is put into perspective.
Just to re-emphasise my point, there is data available to cherry pick for both sides of the debate. But at the end of the day, we have to accept that a warming is taking place, and it is good to know how the frequency and intensity of hurricanes will react. Regardless of what has actually caused the warming.
“But at the end of the day, we have to accept that a warming is taking place, and it is good to know how the frequency and intensity of hurricanes will react.”
Rubish.
Gamecock – would you care to explain why my comment is rubbish? If you have any data that shows the Earth is not warming then do let us all know, I am sure there are a lot of people that would be interested.
Why is it not important to react to any changes? I can think of no one on either side of the debate that would take that attitude. If hurricanes increase then we should be prepared. If they stay similar then we know what to expect and can (theoretically) act accordingly. If they decrease, then we would be wasting valuable resources for something that is not going to happen.
Is not the present day challenge to make an accurate assessment and use resources accordingly?
Oh dear. Has somebody “Woke” decided to show us how clever they are?
‘woke’ and ‘clever’ in the same sentence. Rare to see that. LOL
That’s the problem with the weather and climate averages, reality is way different and clumped with feat and famine. So we’re in a surplus at the moment but we’ll be back to famine soon.
The weather forecast presenters now say about temperature above/below “where they should be” it really irritates me as they are talking average and really what’s significant is if they are in the range of previous temperatures
This “what it should be”, “what it ought to be”, “what it would normally be” etc commenting in weather forecasts drives me nuts and I have complained to the BBC a number of times about it.
February 12th 1895 -21.9°C Braemar, February 12th 1998 Greenwich +19.7°C.
A variation range of 41.6°C. So what “should” or “ought” the temperature be?
This “normality” type representation is clearly deliberate.
The Hurricane data has already been ‘revisited’ by the ‘adjustment crew’, I’m not sure exactly which datasets have been tampered with but way back around 2010 they were openly downgrading older hurricanes based on alternative accounts.