Florida's On Fire, Montana Puts Up A Column, And Severe Drought Lingers On. 99% of Florida is in drought, and the west is about to say, "hold my beer."

From Hotshot Wake Up: "If this is what April looks like, I think it will be a summer to remember. There have already been 20,100 wildfires in the United States, with 1,710,000 acres burned. The 10-year average for this time is 13,597 fires and 875,957 acres burned. We are well ahead of schedule."

Japan reveals new name for 40C-and-hotter days after blistering summer The term - kokushobi - translates to "cruelly hot", "brutally hot" or "severely hot", and comes after Japan's hottest summer on record.

A new language for climate change was voted in: “kokushobi” heat, >40°C (104°F), from the Japanese word koku, meaning harsh or cruel. 2nd choice for the new heat term was ‘super-extremely hot day’ or ‘cho-mosho-bi’, while ‘sauna day’, ‘stay-at-home day’ and ‘boiling day’ were also among the choices.

I’m going to a local town hall May 7 with the CEO of Chase. What should I ask him? Maybe: “I see from your 2025 hire of NOAA’s chief scientist, Dr. Kapnick, you are taking climate charge risk seriously. Then why is Chase still the #1 financier of fossil fuel infrastructure projects?”

Can you make a map for the incidence of my favorite type of precipitation, “a wintry mix”? I want more of that refreshing variety of hydrometers than I’m getting here in Michigan.

Pretty extraordinary that the U.S. is experiencing its worst March drought on record, worse even than the Dust Bowl years of the 1930s. Drought is the most dangerous threat of climate change.

The 10 Northern Lower MI rivers that have set new record highs:

Boardman
Cheboygan
Au Sable
Au Sable South Branch
Thunder Bay
Sturgeon
Jordan
Pine
Manistee
Muskegon

Historic flooding in MI and WI: 5 rivers are at record flood or predicted to be (blue dots); 6 other rivers already set record highs in MI. Mullet Lake in MI is 2' above its record high; the dam at its E end above Cheboygan is just 5" from overtopping; 3 other MI dams are also close to overtopping.

IPCC: “The proportion of intense tropical cyclones (Category 4-5) and peak wind speeds of the most intense tropical cyclones are projected to increase at the global scale with increasing global warming.” My plot: there's a statistically significant trend from 1982-2025 at 1% for global hurricanes.

A study by Climate Central found a human-caused intensity increase ranging from 3%-12% for 2024’s Atlantic hurricanes.

Strongest tropical cyclones by ocean basin, 1980-2026, using ratings from NHC and JTWC. An inordinate number of these have occurred in recent years. Background image credit: Robert Rhode.

Category 5 storms globally, 1982-2025. The blue line shows a linear increasing trend, which is statistically significant at better than the 1% level.

Global warming is making the strongest hurricanes stronger » Yale Climate Connections Recent studies link human-caused warming to more powerful, more destructive storms worldwide.

As the Northern Mariana Islands take stock of the devastation left by Typhoon #Sinlaku, its worth taking a look at the latest research linking global warming to stronger hurricanes: yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/glob...

Category 4 Typhoon Sinlaku powers through the U.S. Northern Mariana Islands » Yale Climate Connections Sinlaku is the 10th Category 4 or 5 tropical cyclone to hit a U.S. state or territory in the past 10 years — as many Cat 4 and Cat 5 landfalls as the U.S. suffered in the prior 57 years.

Typhoon #Sinlaku hit the U.S. Northern Mariana Islands this morning as a Cat 4, making it the 10th Cat 4 or Cat5 tropical cyclone to hit the U.S. in the past 10 years — an unprecedented battering by these intense storms. yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/cate...

JTWC Jan-Apr Cat5s:
Surigae 195 mph Apr 17, 2021
Hester 185 mph Jan 1, 1953
#Sinlaku 185 mph Apr 12, 2026
Maysak 175 mph Mar 31, 2015
Thelma 175 mph Apr 20, 1956
Wutip 165 mph Feb 23, 2019
Isa 165 mph Apr 20, 1997
Mitag 160 mph Mar 5, 2002
Andy 160 mph Apr 21, 1989
Ophelia 160 mph Jan 13, 1958

Here's more from @drjeffmasters.bsky.social on the explosive development of Super Typhoon #Sinlaku, one of the earliest-in-the-year Cat 5 storms ever recorded. @climateconnections.bsky.social

yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/cat-...

Typhoon #Sinlaku topped out with 155 kt winds, very close to its Maximum Potential Intensity (MPI), based on the existing ocean temperatures and atmospheric profiles of temperature and humidity. Rare to see a storm reach its MPI. Graphic from tropic.ssec.wisc.edu

Jan-Apr Cat 5s from JTWC:
Surigae 195 mph Apr 17, 2021
Hester 185 mph Jan 1, 1953
#Sinlaku 180 mph Apr 12, 2026
Maysak 175 mph Mar 31, 2015
Thelma 175 mph Apr 20, 1956
Wutip 165 mph Feb 23, 2019
Isa 165 mph Apr 20, 1997
Mitag 160 mph Mar 5, 2002
Andy 160 mph Apr 21, 1989
Ophelia 160 mph Jan 13, 1958

This was a resonant planetary wave event (more details to come on that--watch this space). Climate models struggle to capture the climate change linkage w/ these events. Some background: penntoday.upenn.edu/news/extreme...

The emerging danger of post-hurricane heat waves » Yale Climate Connections With global warming making people increasingly dependent on air conditioning, power failures from hurricanes followed by heat waves are creating increasingly hazardous risks to health.

The latest installment in my 10-part series on climate change and hurricanes: 4 recent post-hurricane heatwaves have had massive post-storm power outages responsible for multiple heat-related deaths: Beryl (2024), Irma (2017), Laura (2020), and Ida (2021).

yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/the-...

I supplied the “Climate change is kicking our butts” quote for this AP story. There’s going to be a lot more butt-kicking…

The global-average temperature for January-March 2026 was the fourth-highest on record, NOAA said, and "it is almost certain that 2026 will rank among the 10 warmest years on record, and very likely that it will place in the top five." My monthly summary:

yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/we-j...

CSU and TSR calling for a below-average Atlantic hurricane season. Analog years: 2006 (no landfalling Atlantic hurricanes); 2009: 1 landfall (Cat 1 Ida in Nicaragua); 2015, 1 landfall, (Cat 4 Joaquin in the Bahamas); and 2023, 2 landfalls: Cat 3 Idalia (Florida Big Bend) and Cat 1 Tammy (Barbuda).

A bump in hurricane odds along the SE U.S. coast northwards to New England is likely related to El Niño shifting the position of the Azores/Bermuda High eastward, causing more recurving tracks along the U.S. East Coast.

TropicalTidbits (tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/hsa...) page based on newest NMME forecast shows a very inactive Atlantic hurricane season due to a strong El Niño. Activity in analog years (1972, 1982, 1994, 1997, 2015) was reduced across the MDR, Gulf, and Caribbean, but higher for Hawaii.

The year so far: hottest and driest in U.S. history » Yale Climate Connections After a season-defying March heat wave pushed things into overdrive, it’s an open question – and a crucial one – how soon more generous moisture might arrive.

Amazing fact from today's post from @bhensonweather.bsky.social: the contiguous U.S. was hottest on record for March, and for all intervals (2-month, 3-month, etc.) going all the way back to the 12-month period from April 2025 through March 2026. Also true for the past 18-, 24-, 36-, and 48-months.

Contiguous U.S. precipitation for Jan-Mar, 1895-2026. This year set a record low.

The contiguous U.S. averaged precipitation total for 2026 to date is an ominous one: a mere 4.79". That’s the lowest value on record for any January-to-March interval, including such notoriously dry periods as the Dust Bowl of the 1930s. The previous record low was 5.27", set in Jan.-Mar. 1910.

Drought a huge concern this summer. Palmer drought severity index (PDSI) by state for March 2026 had 6 states with their worst drought on record, with 22 others experiencing a top-10 worst drought. Only Michigan had an above-average lack of drought. From: www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/monit...

A powerhouse El Niño event appears to be brewing for 2026-27 » Yale Climate Connections Triplet tropical cyclones astride the equator could help it develop.

Signs of a high-end El Niño in the making are piling up fast. The picture includes an unusual set of tropical cyclones over the western Pacific. More here from me and @drjeffmasters.bsky.social: @climateconnections.bsky.social

yaleclimateconnections.org/2026/04/a-po...

If you like your Easter eggs dyed all red, you'll like this departure of temperature from average map for the past 30 days from drought.gov:

#Maila predicted by JTWC to be the first hurricane-strength cyclone on record so close to the equator (north of 10S) in central Solomon Sea. It could strengthen to Cat 3 equiv.

Steering currents are weak, so colossal rainfall amounts possible over the remote E islands & atolls of Papua New Guinea.