International News: Hurricane Beryl became historic powerful hurricane; forecasters concerned about this year’s hurricane season

By Zoila Palma Gonzalez: Hurricane Beryl made landfall in Texas on Monday after battering Carriacou, Cayman Islands, Jamaica and Mexico causing major flooding, damage to homes and power outages.

The powerful Category 5 storm which later weakened smashed expectations of what an early season hurricane could become, and it has experts concerned for what could be coming next.

Weather experts say that early season storms aren’t indicative of what’s to come later in the season because the necessary atmospheric conditions for powerful storms aren’t yet in place.

“Normally, early-season storm activity doesn’t tell us much about what is going to happen the rest of the time,” Phil Klotzbach, a hurricane expert and research scientist at Colorado State University, told CNN.

“But when storms are strong in the tropical Atlantic and eastern Caribbean, it tends to be a harbinger of a very busy season,” he said.

Usually, the busiest time of the hurricane season commences mid-August, but Beryl which initially formed in late June – behaved like it already arrived.

The water Beryl raced through was as warm as it should be in September, so it behaved like a September hurricane.

“Beryl confirms what we thought about (this) season, that given the extremely warm (water) temperatures that we currently have, we could experience mid-season-type storms earlier than normal,” Klotzbach said.

Ocean temperatures in the Atlantic basin remain historically warm and have been for more than a year, particularly where Beryl first became a hurricane.

According to the report, warm oceans are a major consequence of a world warming due to fossil fuel pollution and provide the fuel for tropical systems to explode in strength at a breakneck pace.

Beryl rapidly intensified faster than any other storm on record this early in the season when its winds increased by 65 mph in just 24 hours, according to Klotzbach.

Rapid intensification is becoming more likely as the climate crisis advances.

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