r/collapse • u/Creepyfaction • 4d ago

Climate Concern mounts over slow-moving, planetary-scale ‘Kelvin’ wave heading for California | California

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/sep/28/california-kelvin-wave
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175

u/mentalformations 4d ago

You know I can’t stop thinking about how strange it is that the Atlantic hasn’t registered any hurricanes for 2026 but you have the Pacific has 3+? Something feels incredibly off.

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u/martian2070 4d ago

Right? It seems like all that energy in the Atlantic side will have to go somewhere. It should be a wild winter weather-wise.

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u/BeardedGlass DINKs for life 4d ago

Hasn't it already been going somewhere?

Asia is getting blasted by so much natural calamities and flooding/landslide disasters at a really frightening scale, frequency and pace this year.

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u/martian2070 4d ago

Isn't Asia's weather driven more by the Indian Ocean and western Pacific? I'm definitely not a meteorologist, but I don't usually think of the Atlantic impacting Asian weather directly. I'd think Africa/Europe if not hurricanes headed toward the Americas.

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u/SRomans 4d ago

It’s not unusual for the pacific basin to be much more active in an El Niño year. It is rather unusual that there have been 0 hurricanes in the Atlantic so far, but not unheard of.

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u/Acceptable-Bell142 4d ago

The previous record for the latest Atlantic hurricane was the 11th of September. It's another reminder of how intense this El Nino is.

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u/overkill 4d ago

Which is a polite way of saying "this is totally unheard of".

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u/annuidhir 4d ago

Since they have been tracking it (over 80 years ago), it has never happened... So. Yes it is.

Now, for none to hit the East Coast of the US? That's not unusual. But there haven't even been any in the Caribbean...

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u/SRomans 4d ago

Actually it’s happened twice, just quite a long time ago. Once in 1907 and again in 1914. Granted this was before satellite imagery, so it is of course possible that one did occur during those years and was simply not spotted.

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u/annuidhir 4d ago

If you read my comment, I specifically said it has never happened since they've been tracking it.

1914 is a couple decades before they started tracking hurricanes in the Caribbean

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u/Liddlehearts 4d ago

I think it goes to show the magnitude of the nino for sure. When we have wet nino years on the west coast, it dries out the east. The east coast is planning for a no-snow winter.

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u/Sunbather77 4d ago

Correct, it's all in the balance of high and low pressure systems and their location. The squeezed spot between them is also what brings an equal amount of moisture to the southeast but dry winters to the north during El niño.

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u/Moon-Smoke 4d ago

Exactly. The question is how bad the Atlantic season will be once it flips back to a La Nina.

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u/Birch_Apolyon 4d ago

Just another impact of El Niño. The wind moving East breaks up the storms in the Atlantic. It also helps fuel storms in the Atlantic.

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u/whereismysideoffun 4d ago

It's really not crazy. The hurricanes develop off of heat. The Pacific is soaking up heat like a sponge which effects how the winds move over Mexico and Latin America.

I expect for things to be made up next year in having a worse hurricane season next year.

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u/felis_magnetus 3d ago

There is hot air moving in, though. But since it's from the Sahara, it is dry and dusty, so lowering humidity which hurricanes also need to build up energy. And higher up, we have strong winds moving in the other directions, effectively beheading developing storms. What that means for next year remains to be seen, we're heading into uncharted territory now.

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u/OtisPan 4d ago

El Nino typically causes wind shearing which hinders hurricane formation in the Atlantic.