New paper finds strong hurricanes were much more common than thought during low-CO2 period 1851-1898

A new paper recompiles hurricanes of the North Atlantic over the very-low CO2 48 year period from 1851-1898 and finds 209 new storms, 90 hurricanes that made landfall [1.875/yr average], an increased count of very-strong category 4 hurricanes from 11 to 25 [average 1.92 per year], and six category 4 hurricanes which made landfall at category 4 [on average every 8 years] 

By comparison, the US is currently in a record-breaking hurricane drought, with the last category 4-5 hurricane at landfall in the US 22 years ago in 1992 [Andrew], and the last category 3 at landfall was 9 years ago in 2005 [Wilma]. 

In addition, Accumulated Cyclone Energy [ACE] is also at some of the lowest levels on record:

Scaremongering stories of increased frequency or intensity of hurricanes from CAGW are without observational basis. In addition, climate models project decreased frequency and intensity of hurricanes in the future, due to a decrease in temperature gradients between the tropics and poles. 

Journal of Climate 2014 ; e-View

doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-13-00771.1

A New Compilation of North Atlantic Tropical Cyclones, 1851-1898

Michael Chenoweth¹

¹ Independent Scholar, 6816 Ducketts Lane, Elkridge, MD, USA

Abstract

A comprehensive new compilation of North Atlantic tropical cyclone activity for the years 1851-1898 is presented and compared with the “HURricane DATa 2^nd Generation” (HURDAT2) database for the same years. This new analysis is based on the retrieval of 9,072 newspaper marine shipping news reports, 1,260 original logbook records, 271 Maury abstract logs, 147 U.S. marine meteorological journals and 34 UK Meteorological Office logbooks. Records from throughout North America and the Caribbean region were used along with other primary and secondary references holding unique land and marine data. For the first time, North Atlantic daily weather maps for 1864-1865, 1873 and 1881-1898 were used in historical tropical cyclone research.

Results for the years 1851-1898 include the omission of 62 of the 361 HURDAT2 storms, and the further reduction due to merging of storms to a total of 288 unique HURDAT 2 tropical cyclones. The new compilation gave a total of 497 tropical cyclones in the 48-year record, or an average of 10.4 storms year^-1 compared to 6.0 year^-1 in HURDAT2 less the author’s omissions. Of this total, 209 storms are completely new. A total of 90 hurricanes made landfall in the United States during this time. Seven new U.S. landfalling hurricanes are present in the new data set but not in HURDAT2. Eight U.S. landfalling hurricanes in HURDAT2 are now considered to have only tropical storm impact or were actually extratropical at landfall. Across the North Atlantic, the number of Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale Category 4 hurricanes, compared with HURDAT2, increased from 11 to 25, six of which made U.S. landfall at Category 4 level.