Should there be a 'Category 6' hurricane?

AccuWeather

There have been discussions about creating a "Category 6" hurricane in the Saffir-Simpson scale. AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist Jon Porter weighs in on whether a new category should be added or not.

Transcript

00:00about making a new category called Category 6 here on the Saffir-Simpson scale.

00:10But before we get to that, let's go over the real impact scale for hurricanes that we have here at AccuWeather

00:17compared to the Saffir-Simpson scale. What's the difference?

00:20Well, that's a great point. And the Saffir-Simpson scale, which is the scale that most meteorologists

00:25and National Hurricane Center have used for decades to describe the impact of a hurricane,

00:31considers only one factor. That's the wind. See, that only considers the wind,

00:36whereas AccuWeather's real impact scale for hurricanes that we've used successfully for five years now

00:41includes certainly the wind. That's an important consideration.

00:44But also impacts for flooding, rain, storm surge, and coastal inundation, and economic damage and loss.

00:51And you know, Bernie, when we look at the statistics, we see that more than 85% of the fatalities

00:56from tropical storms and hurricanes come from that flooding, rain, and coastal inundation.

01:01So the scale that we have here, the AccuWeather real impact scale for hurricanes,

01:05is much more inclusive of the actual risk that people may face.

01:09I want to go to Lynx 1 right now, John, because I want to go over, for those that are unaware of it,

01:14if we can go to Lynx 1. This is the Saffir-Simpson scale.

01:17And again, there's been discussion about adding a sixth category, John.

01:22There has. We don't think that makes a lot of sense here at AccuWeather.

01:25Because of the fact that, you notice, when you get a Category 5 hurricane,

01:29that's maximum sustained winds above 156 mph.

01:33You're going to be dealing with catastrophic damage to most structures

01:37and incredible risk to life and property.

01:40And that doesn't change much if you get a higher wind speed.

01:45It's still a catastrophic risk.

01:47So the idea of having another level, you would add that if it's going to help people make better decisions.

01:53That's not the case in this scenario, because we're already talking about catastrophic damage.

01:58Also, we haven't seen hurricanes make landfall with winds at that higher threshold.

02:05So it doesn't seem to make sense on many different fronts.

02:08All right, John. Let's go back to Lynx 8-2 here, because I want to show you,

02:11we do have a sixth scale, though, for the AccuWeather Real Impact Scale.

02:15Let's go over the categories from less than one and ending at five.

02:20Well, that's a great point.

02:21We did add to the existing Saffir-Simpson scale,

02:26when we were making the AccuWeather Real Impact Scale, a less than one characterization.

02:31And that's for storms that will have some impact, but not a significant impact,

02:35in order to be able to describe that.

02:37So we do have six levels on the AccuWeather Exclusive Real Impact Scale for hurricanes,

02:42starting with that less than one, and then, of course, going up to five,

02:46where we're talking about catastrophic damage, especially to population areas,

02:50and the kind of damage that can alter coastlines for generations,

02:54what we saw with Hurricane Ian in 2022 and Hurricane Michael, for example,

02:59just a few of the examples in recent years.

03:01But also, Bernie, it's not only just the wind, as we talked about.

03:04All those other factors, the tropical storm Allison in 2001 that affected the Houston metro area

03:11and produced catastrophic flooding, that was a five on AccuWeather's Real Impact Scale for hurricanes.

03:16So you can see we're focused on the impacts far beyond just wind.

03:19We were talking about some of the Category 5s, John,

03:22a review of the strongest hurricanes ever to make landfall here in the United States.

03:29There it is.

03:31Still the strongest storm ever.

03:33And, boy, if there was an extreme decade in the United States, it had to be the 30s.

03:38If it wasn't for the Dust Bowl, then it was for this, the Florida Key Hurricane in 1935.

03:44Look at that, maximum sustained winds at landfall of 185 miles per hour.

03:49The scientists that were proposing, or at least bringing up,

03:52should there be a Category 6 on the Saffir-Simpson Scale had that breakpoint at 192.

03:57So this storm wouldn't even classify into the Category 6 in that kind of definition anyway.

04:03And when you look around the world at the historical records,

04:06very few storms will even classify in that level.

04:09And we're not expecting, even with a warming atmosphere,

04:12that the intensity of those storms would be much higher.

04:15Certainly the frequency of storms that have those intense winds will continue to increase.

04:20That's something that we're very confident of.

04:23AccuWeather Chief Meteorologist Jonathan Portijohn, thanks for joining us here on AccuWeather Early.

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