Relax, Al. It’s just one, measly, obscure study. I mean, really, who cares what the people at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the University of Miami think. Right? Am I right?
WASHINGTON – Global warming could reduce how many hurricanes hit the United States, according to a new federal study that clashes with other research. The new study is the latest in a contentious scientific debate over how manmade global warming may affect the intensity and number of hurricanes.
In it, researchers link warming waters, especially in the Indian and Pacific oceans, to increased vertical wind shear in the Atlantic Ocean near the United States. Wind shear — a change in wind speed or direction — makes it hard for hurricanes to form, strengthen and stay alive.
So that means “global warming may decrease the likelihood of hurricanes making landfall in the United States,” according to researchers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Miami Lab and the University of Miami.
Yes, but was world-renowned climatologist extraordinaire Albert A. Gore on their panel? MSNBC feels the need to devote the next few paragraphs to reminding us that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change believes the opposite. The IPCC being the Nobel Prize winning group that several scientists had to threaten to sue in order to have their names taken off of the group’s global warming report. The IPCC apparently just assumed its members agreed with the panel’s findings.
But hurricane researchers, especially scientists at NOAA’s Miami Lab, have argued that the long-term data for all hurricanes show no such trend. And Wang’s new research suggests just the opposite of the view that more intense hurricanes result from global warming. The Miami faction points to a statement by an international workshop on tropical cyclones that says “no firm conclusion can be made on this point.”
As for Max Mayfield, he’s not apparently taking a side in this dispute, instead saying that it only takes one storm to be deadly, so be prepared.
(Via Hot Air)
by Stephan Tawney on Thu, Jan 24, 2008