Detected climatic change in global distribution of tropical cyclones

However, there is a distinct spatial pattern of the trends in tropical cyclone frequency of occurrence on a global scale since 1980, with substantial decreases in the southern Indian Ocean and western North Pacific and increases in the North Atlantic and central Pacific.

Here, using a suite of high-resolution dynamical model experiments, we show that the observed spatial pattern of trends is very unlikely to be explained entirely by underlying multidecadal internal variability; rather, external forcing such as greenhouse gases, aerosols, and volcanic eruptions likely played an important role. This study demonstrates that a climatic change in terms of the global spatial distribution of tropical cyclones has already emerged in observations and may in part be attributable to the increase in greenhouse gas emissions.