Dozing Atop the Flood Walls

Anything That Encourages Hurricane Complacency is a Danger

SOURCE: AP/NOAA The 2009 Atlantic hurricane season begins this week—but forecasts of a tamer year should make us raise our guard, not lower it. Above: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico.

First the good news: Those sampling the latest spate of forecasts for the 2009 Atlantic hurricane season—which officially began on Monday—have reason to feel at least some relief. During an era that has shown possibly unprecedented levels of storm violence, we’re now told to expect a tamer year, something along the lines of an easygoing 2006 rather than a devastating 2005.

So far, the consensus of forecasts augurs that President Obama’s first hurricane season will be an “average” one: Something like 10 named storms, 6 hurricanes, and 2 intense ones of Category 3 or greater. The reasons are at least twofold: Sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic region are cooler than average right now, having been stirred and mixed by strong trade winds; and there is the possibility of the development of El Nino conditions that tend to tamp down Atlantic hurricane activity. (For a fuller discussion of the current forecasts, see here.)

Forecasters quickly add, however, that it only takes one storm to turn a milder year into a very bad one. It is notable that one possible analogue year for 2009, according to Colorado State University forecasters William Gray and Phil Klotzbach, is 1965. That’s the year of Hurricane Betsy, which was—before Katrina—the worst storm to hit New Orleans in modern times.

So as we survey the latest forecasts and prepare for the 2009 season, it’s important to bear in mind that anything that encourages hurricane complacency—including predictions of mild weather—is itself a danger. Throngs of experts have repeatedly warned that we’re extremely vulnerable to these storms, and not nearly where we ought to be in our preparedness measures. Indeed, I would argue that as a society, we still haven’t adequately processed, or responded to, all of the lessons of Katrina.

In 2006, following the devastation caused by that storm as well as by Hurricanes Rita and Wilma, the National Science Board released a report observing that “the present Federal investment in hurricane science and engineering research relative to the tremendous damage and suffering caused by hurricanes is insufficient and time is not on our side. The hurricane warning for our Nation has been issued and we must act vigorously and without delay.” Yet the 2007 National Hurricane Research Initiative Act, a response to this report and the general post-Katrina sense of hurricane vulnerability, did not make it out of committee in the last Congress. So much for acting “without delay.”

Legislators will try again to pass a version of this law in the 111^th Congress, but by now we have strong reason to question whether making dramatic new investments in hurricane research counts as a congressional priority. One would think such funding would rank high among legislative no-brainers; that hurricane funding bills would pass as easily as resolutions naming bridges and highways. But if our leaders couldn’t act in the wake of Katrina, why expect them to act in the wake of Ike?

Someone ought to tell Congress that while we have the best hurricane forecasters in the world at the National Hurricane Center, their hands are still tied by inadequate scientific knowledge. Numerous factors constrain their abilities, most notably our incomplete understanding of why hurricanes intensify or weaken. Forecasters have become excellent when it comes to pinpointing where storms will go, but they can’t yet tell you with as much accuracy how strong they’ll be when they get there. As strong storms cause dramatically more damage than weak ones, this is a key vulnerability.

And then there’s global warming, another arena in which, despite considerable controversy and research, we still just don’t know enough about its effect on hurricanes. Having followed this debate for years, I must confess myself more uncertain than ever about the takeaway message, at least when one gets into matters of any significant detail.

There remains a general expectation that storms will get worse as oceans warm; there is evidence, albeit contested, that this is already apparent in the Atlantic region (along with an increase in storm numbers). And yet the more research that comes out on this subject, the more questions we encounter. Consider, for instance, recent published work by Thomas Knutson of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, a scientist known as a cautious moderate in the hurricane-climate debate. Knutson’s latest published study, using a regional model of the Atlantic region and examining hurricane trends under greenhouse warming, suggests we may see fewer storms in total, but also more intense ones. This would appear to contradict what we have seen during the last 15 years or so in the Atlantic, years that have featured both more numerous storms and also stronger ones.

The point is that we have many reasons to learn more about, and prepare more for, hurricanes. Indeed, we have essentially no reasons to do anything else. The question, then, is whether what we do will be reasonable. A good defense, in this instance, is exactly that—a good defense; and investment in the necessary forecasting research and preparations will protect our vulnerable coastal communities that are still rebuilding in the wake of the last miscalculation.

Chris Mooney is contributing editor to Science Progress and author of several books, including The Republican War on Science and the forthcoming Unscientific America: How Scientific Illiteracy Threatens Our Future, co-authored by Sheril Kirshenbaum. He and Kirshenbaum blog at “The Intersection.”

Tags: Climate Change, hurricanes

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