Typhoon attacks on Southeast Asia are getting stronger

Over the past 40 years, storms attacking East and Southeast Asia have become more and more powerful - and perhaps that will continue, thanks to the "support" of climate change. The cause may stem from the warming of near-shore sea water , according to a new study. The results of the published study show that climate change may be the main culprit, in creating super-strong storms that hit eastern China, Taiwan, South Korea and Japan; At the same time, it keeps growing in the future. Seawater is expected to become warmer in the coming years, creating favorable conditions for "relaying" the storms.

"If you warm the water in the seaside, that means that the storm can get a little more strength, just before it landed on land. It's obviously not good news , " said Kerry Emanuel, professor. Meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA), who did not participate in this study. However, he also provided some data for the researchers.

Typhoons are often formed outside the ocean in tropical regions , with winds of at least 119km / h. When entering land, storms can become mass killers, destroying everything on their way. The latest storm is likely that Lionrock landed in Japan last week, causing much damage to the facility and killing at least 9 people.

Warm sea water makes storms stronger because it is provided with more heat, in other words, storms will have more energy. To make it easy to imagine, just imagine walking out of the bathroom, you feel cold because the water from the skin evaporates, and carries some heat. The heat leaves your body but does not disappear but is added to the air. The same thing happens with storms. "Fuel increases the power of a storm as a large amount of heat from the ocean, enters the air and encounters strong winds on the surface," Emanuel said.

Ruins of an area after Haiyan storms over.(Photo: Wikipedia).

The researchers reanalyzed two different data sets to calculate the intensity of tropical storms from 1977 to the present, including documents from the Joint Storm Warning Center (JTWC), inter-force force. United States Navy and Air Force; and Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). They found that storms that once attacked East Asia and Southeast Asia had a 12-14% increase in strength. Besides, the group of scientists also found that the number of storms of level 4 and 5 (according to Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale) - usually with wind speed of 209km / h to 252km / h or higher - has increased from zero more than 5 episodes at the end of 1970 until 7 storms / year at present.

The researchers also looked at how ocean temperatures in the Pacific Northwest changed from mid-1977 to 2013. The results show that the waters in the oceans are off the East and Southeast Asia. , where the storm is stronger than ever, it has become much warmer. In contrast, in the more remote oceans, the water temperature does not increase much and therefore the intensity of the storms has not changed significantly. This suggests that the storms are getting stronger and stronger because of the warm waters, which provide energy for tropical storms.

Instead of focusing on global trends, the focus of the study is to learn about storms that will land in densely populated areas, often causing serious damage. However, this research topic has not been able to give an exact reason why the storm is getting stronger, because of human-induced climate change, or it is just a natural trend that occurs on Our planet? With little data in the past 40 years, perhaps we have not yet been able to conclude anything.

Goni and Atsani - two identical storms that attacked East Asia in 2015. (Photo: pbs).

Before 1977, JMA did not provide storm measurements, according to Wei Mei, tutor at the University of North Carolina (USA), and a leader of the study. Mei also said that in the 1970s, there were not many satellites to do this. Some researchers also argue that the storm data provided by JTWC and JMA are not the same. The JMA calculated the average windstorm for 10 minutes, while the JTWC only counted it for 1 minute. Researchers had to adjust the JMA data to compensate for this difference, and of course lead to errors."There are some uncertainties in the results," said Christina Patricola, atmospheric scientist at Texas A&M Univeristy University.

However, Emanuel, a professor of meteorology at MIT, said the study author did very well in cross-checking data between JTWC and JMA with other sources, such as using measurement satellites and their own model. Although there is no exact answer to the question of why the storm is getting stronger, research shows that the offshore waters of East and Southeast Asia continue to warm up. It is a condition to further strengthen the storms, making their destructive power more intense in the future."Storms can cause very serious damage in human society," Mei said. "An important factor in determining damage is the intensity and size of the storm ."