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The water around Jamaica had been simmering all summer.
By the time Hurricane Melissa roared ashore Tuesday, that uber-warm Caribbean Sea had helped turn it into a monster: a Category 5 storm with winds reaching 185 miles an hour, tied for the strongest hurricane to strike land in the Atlantic.
Experts say it's a visceral example of what climate change can do to the planet's most fearsome storms — supercharging them with heat and moisture until they become almost unrecognizable from the Atlantic hurricanes of the past.
Jamaica is waking up to devastation, with severe damage to infrastructure including the electric grid, hospitals and schools. But the true extent of the damage in the hardest-hit communities may take days to uncover, as rescue workers and families struggle to reach them.
Human-caused climate change made such hot water far more likely, according to the research group Climate Central.
This type of hurricane behavior is becoming more common. "We've seen a notable uptick in the rates of explosive intensification," with winds increasing by at least 60 mph in 24 hours across most ocean basins, during the past four decades or more, said Steve Bowen, chief scientist at Gallagher Re.
It's what scientists have been predicting, he said: Hotter oceans are going to support "top-tier intensity" hurricanes.
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📸 : NOAA/AP
