Surging Sea Temperatures Fuel a Dramatic Rise in Extreme Hurricanes: Study Reveals Alarming Trend

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Jeff Berardelli serves as the Chief Meteorologist and Climate Specialist at WFLA. Stay informed on Tampa Bay’s weather and climate developments by following him on X and Bluesky.

TAMPA, Fla. (WFLA) — Hurricane Melissa recently made headlines as one of the most powerful hurricanes ever recorded in the Atlantic. Does this mean that climate change is making hurricanes more intense?

The straightforward answer is no. To establish a link to climate change, we need a much longer historical record.

Still, existing data does indicate a significant rise in the number of the most intense hurricanes, as well as an increase in how quickly these storms gain strength.

Hurricane Melissa is forecasted to near Bermuda today, according to the National Hurricane Center.

Now, there have been two rapid attribution studies to find that Melissa was indeed spiked by climate change — perhaps by as much as 10-15%. But more robust evidence for the climate warming signal is easy to detect.

To determine this, Max Defender 8 Chief Meteorologist Jeff Berardelli looked at extreme hurricanes — category 4s and 5s — since 1980, breaking them up into two equal length periods.

From 1980 to 2002, there were 30 extreme hurricanes. But from 2003 to 2025 there have been 57 — nearly double. This is shown in the comparison below.

This spike in intense hurricanes is at least partly due to warmer waters. For instance, the water under Melissa was 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit above recent normals, and likely 4 degrees Fahrenheit above ocean temps 100 years ago. That is a huge amount of extra heat to super charge hurricanes.

In the image below, you can see that the vast majority of global oceans have warmed over the past few decades. That’s because 90% of the excess heat from greenhouse warming is stored in our oceans.

Berardelli also looked at “extreme rapid intensification (RI)” during the same two periods. That’s when hurricanes intensify extremely fast, defined as 70 mph of strengthening in 24 hours.

It turns out the impact there is even more astonishing. In the early period, only three storms matched that criteria. But in the more recent period, 18 storms achieved extreme RI.

Rapid intensification is a calling card of climate change, with studies finding that has been increasing every decade since the 1970s, by about 5 mph per decade. So that means a storm today will, on average, rapidly intensify at a rate about 20 mph faster than it would have 40 years ago.

Now, getting back to Melissa. Hurricane hunters recorded a record setting wind speed of 252 mph, 700 feet above the ground. Many experts believe this will lead the National Hurricane Center to upgrade Melissa in post season analysis to potentially the strongest Atlantic hurricane on record.

Climate Central did an analysis and found that the hot Caribbean water under Melissa was made 800 times more likely by manmade climate change and thus the storm’s wind and rain was made more intense.