CLIMATE SCIENCE: Eye of the Beholder

H. Jesse Smith 
One of the most contentious issues in the debate about the impact of
global warming on hurricanes is the accuracy of hurricane records; it is
important for hurricane intensity measurements to be evaluated in a
consistent manner, so that methodological differences do not introduce
spurious trends. Kossin et al. take a step in that direction by
constructing a homogeneous global record of hurricane intensity between
1983 and 2005, using the available satellite data archive of nearly
170,000 observations of more than 2000 tropical storms. After
standardizing the spatial and temporal resolution of the images, they
treat all the data (from the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans) with
a single algorithm for estimating hurricane intensity, based on the
infrared brightness temperatures of the storms measured by satellites.
Their analysis reveals a rise in storm intensity and the power
dissipated by storms in the North Atlantic over the period of
investigation, but no significant trends in the global averages. These
findings would seem to contradict the assertion that hurricanes are
becoming more intense as climate warms, because sea surface
temperatures, the factor generally believed to have the greatest impact
on hurricane strength, have risen in all ocean basins over the same
period. -- HJS 
Geophys. Res. Lett. 34, L04815 (2007).
 
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