Department of Atmospheric Science, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO 80523.
Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2013 Sep 17;110(38):15211-5. doi: 10.1073/pnas.1308732110. Epub 2013 Sep 3.
Superstorm Sandy ravaged the eastern seaboard of the United States, costing a great number of lives and billions of dollars in damage. Whether events like Sandy will become more frequent as anthropogenic greenhouse gases continue to increase remains an open and complex question. Here we consider whether the persistent large-scale atmospheric patterns that steered Sandy onto the coast will become more frequent in the coming decades. Using the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project, phase 5 multimodel ensemble, we demonstrate that climate models consistently project a decrease in the frequency and persistence of the westward flow that led to Sandy's unprecedented track, implying that future atmospheric conditions are less likely than at present to propel storms westward into the coast.
超级风暴桑迪袭击了美国东海岸，造成了大量生命损失和数十亿美元的损失。随着人为温室气体的持续增加，像桑迪这样的事件是否会变得更加频繁，仍然是一个悬而未决且复杂的问题。在这里，我们考虑引导桑迪沿海岸线移动的持续的大规模大气模式是否会在未来几十年变得更加频繁。我们使用耦合模式比较计划第五阶段多模式集合来证明，气候模型一致地预测到导致桑迪异常路径的向西流动的频率和持续时间减少，这意味着未来的大气条件不太可能像现在这样推动风暴向西进入海岸。
