Question: how dose global warming cause hurricans

Sarah-Jane Walsh answered on 21 Jun 2013:

First we need to understand how hurricanes work

Hurricanes can only form in hot and humid conditions it needs to be hot and wet and windy, thats why most of them form over warm oceans.

Hurricanes are caused by low presserue weather systems, as air warms up the gas molecules become less dense causing the warm air to rise. You also need concerging winds, these are two winds coming from opposite directions which force the rising air up at a point which will become the center of the hurricane. the air is forced upward and then spreads out away from the center. due to the spin of the earth the hurricane winds begin to spin. Its a cascade effect once it starts it can get bigger and bigger as long as there is a constant supply of warm moist air. hurricanes can never form on the equator because they cannot spin there due to no spinning force. Check out this site fore more information http://eo.ucar.edu/kids/dangerwx/hurricane3.htm

So now we know what causes hurricanes we can link it to global warming. well the three things we need for hurricanes is heat, wet and wind. so the hint is in the name… global warming means the planet will get warmer so thats check one. Global warming will also produce more rain in certain areas such as the east atlantic and west pacific, right where it is the hurrican hotspot over america! this is beacuse as the earth wars the air can hold more moisture, but weather predictions show these will clump over areas that are already wet… making them wetter! Then last but not least winds, many winds are caused by the jet stream, which is proppelled by temperature differences between the tropcs and the poles. evidence actually suggests that these winds may decrease as the poles will melt faster than the tropics warm so weakening the jet stream.

So some evidence points to an increase in hurricanes and otheres against it. However scientific studies have concluded although they cant yet tell if the frequency of hurricane will increase, studies do show that the intensity of hurricanes will increase, meaning the storms are stronger and more damaging. There is some indication that global warming has already done this, with hurricane intensity showing a trend of being stronger and stronger! Just look at Katrina and Sandy!

For the scientific results check out here http://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/global-warming-and-hurricanes