Recent migration of tropical cyclones toward coasts
Too close for comfort
Tropical cyclones are becoming stronger and occurring at higher latitudes than in the past. Wang and Toumi report that cyclones' points of maximum intensity also have been coming closer to land since 1982, the distance decreasing by about 30 kilometers per decade as their paths drift poleward and westward (see the Perspective by Camargo and Wing). This shift could increase the danger that tropical cyclones pose to coastal populations.
Abstract
Poleward migrations of tropical cyclones have been observed globally, but their impact on coastal areas remains unclear. We investigated the change in global tropical cyclone activity in coastal regions over the period 1982–2018. We found that the distance of tropical cyclone maximum intensity to land has decreased by about 30 kilometers per decade, and that the annual frequency of global tropical cyclones increases with proximity to land by about two additional cyclones per decade. Trend analysis reveals a robust migration of tropical cyclone activity toward coasts, concurrent with poleward migration of cyclone locations as well as a statistically significant westward shift. This zonal shift of tropical cyclone tracks may be mainly driven by global zonal changes in environmental steering flow.
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Supplementary Material
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Figs. S1 to S6
Tables S1 to S5
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References and Notes
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Volume 371 | Issue 6528
29 January 2021
29 January 2021
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Copyright © 2021 The Authors, some rights reserved; exclusive licensee American Association for the Advancement of Science. No claim to original U.S. Government Works.
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Submission history
Received: 26 March 2020
Accepted: 30 November 2020
Published in print: 29 January 2021
Acknowledgments
We thank C. Landsea, two anonymous reviewers, and K. Emanuel for helpful comments. Funding: Supported by the UK-China Research and Innovation Partnership Fund through the Met Office Climate Science for Service Partnership (CSSP) China as part of the Newton Fund. Author contributions: S.W. and R.T. conceived the study. S.W. performed the analysis. Both authors discussed the results and jointly contributed to writing the manuscript. Competing interests: The authors declare no competing interests. Data and materials availability: The tropical cyclone best-track data can be downloaded from the National Centers for Environmental Information website (www.ncdc.noaa.gov/ibtracs/index.php). The ERA5, MERRA, and NCEP/NCAR reanalysis data are available at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (www.ecmwf.int/en/forecasts/datasets/reanalysis-datasets/era5), the NASA Modeling and Assimilation Data and Information Services Center (https://gmao.gsfc.nasa.gov/reanalysis/MERRA-2/), and the NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory (https://psl.noaa.gov/data/reanalysis/reanalysis.shtml), respectively.
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