Buckle up East Coasters! An even stronger 'storm of the century' is coming

Climate change is making storms on the US East Coast stronger and more destructive, a study has found. The nor’easters bring terrible rain, snow and flooding to this part of the US between September and April. Climate pollution is supercharging these storms, creating life-threatening conditions on this coast. Nor’easters are formed because of the clash between cold Arctic air from the north and warmer, moist air from the Atlantic Ocean. The US East Coast has witnessed some terrible storms over the last few decades, so much so that their names are equally scary as the havoc they wreaked. One such storm was the “Storm of the Century” in March 1993. Packing winds that blew at more than 100 mph, the storm dumped almost 60 inches of snow and killed more than 200 people. Another was the “Snowmageddon” in 2010 that affected Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia and West Virginia, killing 41 people. The destruction was also huge, and people went without power for days. Also Read: 11,500-year-old formation set off Earth's largest waterfall that is invisible to human eye

Scientist stuck in Snowmageddon had a light-bulb moment

One of the authors of the study, Michael Mann, a climate scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, found himself stuck in Snowmageddon at a hotel room in Philadelphia. For three days, he could not go anywhere, and this led him to wonder about the link between global warming and the storms on the East Coast. As Earth warms, the number of nor’easters is expected to go down since the temperature contrast would be less to fuel the storms. This is because the Arctic is heating up faster than the rest of the Northern Hemisphere. While the number of storms in a warming world is often a point of focus in scientific studies, the intensity has often been ignored, Mann said. Also Read: Why is India where it is? Because 'ghost' force under Oman pushed it 40 million years ago

Storms had become stronger in 85 years

To try and understand how storms had changed over the years, Mann and his team pulled out historical data from between 1940 and 2025, and used a cyclone tracking algorithm to analyse the behaviour of nor’easters. A total of 900 such storms were listed in the atlas, and they found that the maximum windspeed of the most intense nor’easters had increased by around 6 per cent since 1940. Considering the length of the period was 85 years, this change might look minor. However, on the ground, that equates to a 20 per cent increase in the storm’s destructive potential, Mann said. “That’s substantial.” The study was published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Mann says the intensifying storms can be blamed on "basic physics". Oceans and air are becoming warmer, leading to more evaporation, adding moisture to the atmosphere. This leads to the dumping of more rain and snow. Mann has warned that current estimates for floods on the East Coast are highly underestimated. “Nor’easters have been neglected, and that’s another contribution to increased coastal risk that we haven’t really been focusing on enough,” Mann added. Experts call for better preparedness, especially among coastal communities on the East Coast, as storms become stronger.