Hurricane Kirk, which raged on Tuesday, remained in the shadow of the great element Milton, which hit Florida. Kirk, no longer classified as a hurricane but as an extratropical storm, is likely to cause damage and disruption in parts of Europe, reports Euronews.
"We no longer see a tropical storm with the typical round, symmetrical cloud structure and a calm eye in the center," says meteorologist Lars Lovinsky, explaining that the storm becomes less "tropical" as it moves away from warm waters.
Kirk was originally a major hurricane that moved between Bermuda in the Caribbean and the Azores in the mid-Atlantic over the weekend. It even reached category 4 in a short time.
"It will now remain very strong as it develops into a powerful North Atlantic storm, as we often see over the North Atlantic and Western Europe in the fall and winter," Lovinsky said.
What impact will Kirk have in Europe?
Arriving in mainland Europe, Kirk is likely to start affecting northern Portugal and northwestern Spain, with very strong winds and heavy rain.
"The main area of strong winds will pass with gusts between 100 and 130 km/h, up to around 145 km/h in high places. Heavy rain and thunderstorms will also be a problem, with amounts between 100 and 150 mm [of rain] likely in 24-36 hours in some parts of northwestern Spain," Lovinski said.
Expectations are that the storm will then continue to the east-northeast and reach France. Very strong winds are likely to affect a large corridor from the coast of the Bay of Biscay to eastern France, northwestern Switzerland and then southwestern Germany. Peak gusts could reach 140-150 km/h along coastal parts of western/south-western France and between 100-130 km/h elsewhere.
Lovinsky also warned that heavy rain would be a threat, mainly in central and northern parts of France. It may also spread to Belgium and western Germany, with up to 100mm of rain expected to be recorded by the end of the week.
Kirk is likely to bring significant impacts from strong winds and heavy rain to the aforementioned regions. Wind impacts include tree and roof damage, power outages, blocked roads and rail lines. With the trees still in leaf, the impacts of this storm in France, Switzerland and Germany will be greater than similar strong storms in winter.
Heavy rain may also lead to flash and river floods and in the worst case to possible landslides in mountainous areas.
Although high waves and moderate storm surge could potentially occur along central parts of the Bay of Biscay coast, the risk of flooding appears to be quite low. Weather experts also say Kirk could bring hours of heavy rain and strong winds to parts of the UK - but it is not yet clear how severe they could be.
Does climate change affect hurricane strength?
"While it is not unusual to see hurricanes in the tropical Atlantic in October, Hurricane Kirk was unusually strong for a system that is far to the east of the main area of development, which is closer to the Caribbean for this time of year. The fact that such an intense storm could develop so far east may indeed be another sign of the impact of climate change, as sea surface temperatures are above average across large parts of the North Atlantic. "Warmer oceans mean there is more energy to 'power' these systems, leading to a greater likelihood of rapid intensification and often higher wind speeds and more significant amounts of precipitation," Lovinsky says.
Deep Sky Research, a Montreal-based organization for carbon dioxide removal projects, has released its research on the risk of hurricanes in the United States that are increasingly impacting Europe and beyond. Experts there found that there is a wealth of evidence showing how the risk of hurricanes is changing due to climate change. Perhaps most alarmingly, they found that the frequency of deadly hurricanes had risen by an alarming 300 percent.
Heavy hurricane rainfall that causes damage and death usually occurs only once every 100 years. Today it will happen every 25 years. Deep Sky experts also found that the likelihood of smaller storms doubled.
"Many of the impacts of climate change develop slowly, but some will be devastating as they escalate rapidly. We will see the impact of worsening hurricanes not in the next 50 years, but in the next five. This will mean billions of dollars in damage, hundreds of thousands of homes destroyed and many lives lost," warns Deep Sky.