Could we ever see Category 6?
Climatologists use five types to categorize hurricanes running from 1 to 5, 5 being the most severe. A 5 is defined as a hurricane that is anything above 157 mph. Last year Hurricane Patricia reached 215 mph which is a record for the Western Hemisphere. Could we ever see even more severe storm events that might be categorized as an as yet unknown Category 6?
Computer models are the best, indeed only way we have to picture future events and are notoriously less than perfect, as nobody knows precisely what the speculative future information fed into them will precisely be. Nevertheless, they have proved to be a broadly far better than inaccurate tool so far. Scientists feeding the best available data about future global warming into their models have come up with some terrifying estimates of what future Category 6 hurricanes might be like. Areas most likely to be hit by such monsters are Tampa Florida, Cairns in Australia and the Persian Gulf. Such places could be hit by 233 mph plus hurricanes that would cause waves 36 feet high. And it wouldn’t just be Tampa, Cairns and the Persian Gulf. The kind of total devastation of a town we are seeing at Palu in Indonesia at the moment could be the fate of a whole city the size of New York or London. Doom and gloom scenarios? Maybe but maybe not. Do we really want to take bets that such things will never happen, not speculating on day dreams but the best scientific predictions that we have? We need to go all out to get rid of the fossil fuels that are causing climate change. Join Climate100. Join our facebook group The Next Twenty Years. But why bother when you can distract yourself with reality TV shows? And Brexit is just brilliant, we are heading for a golden future in an independent UK says Mrs May. I wonder whether she has considered the possibility of Category Sixers?
