Hurricane Milton has been a surprise at almost every turn.

What began as a small, well-scarred hurricane has grown into a vast monster that has grown in strength at the fastest rate in recorded history. The storm could cause dangerous flooding across parts of Florida's west and east coasts, particularly putting the flood-prone areas of Tampa Bay, home to more than 3 million people, at risk.

As the storm developed, record warmth in the Gulf of Mexico helped the storm intensify. He then underwent an eyewall replacement process to increase in size.

Explain how Milton developed into such a serious threat.

Pacific influence

Hurricanes approaching the United States typically follow similar paths. Tropical cyclones form off the west coast of Africa, gain strength as they cross the Atlantic Ocean and enter the warm waters of the Caribbean Sea.

But part of Milton's origin story lies in the eastern Pacific. This hurricane formed when the remnants of a tropical cyclone in the Pacific Ocean pushed eastward across the Yucatan Peninsula and encountered a stationary front in the Gulf of Mexico. The most recent storm to hit Florida after forming in the same area, Mexico's Bay of Campeche, occurred in 1867.

Follow live updates about Hurricane Milton

Chris Slocum, a physical scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Satellite Applications Center, said that when the tropical storm entered the Gulf Coast, it created “a little bit of a vortex, some rotation” in the thunderstorm system there.

Milton was then organized and kept away from other star systems.

“By being isolated from other thunderstorms, the pressure increases and the winds increase,” Slocum said. Milton began to draw air toward its center, drawing energy from the warm ocean.

small but strong

Milton started out as a very small storm, which conserved its angular momentum and rotated tightly and rapidly around a narrow eye.

The Gulf Coast experienced record high ocean temperatures and moist, warm air. These are the necessary elements to strengthen your power. On Monday, the central pressure in Milton's core decreased at a constant rate. A scientist was described as “crazy” As Milton grows stronger. The value of central pressure is closely related to storm strength and wind speed.

“This is absolutely terrifying,” NBC South Florida hurricane expert John Morales said, choking on the air as he talked about the importance of the pressure drop.

Milton's wind speed is 92 mph in about 24 hoursAccording to the nonprofit research organization Climate Central. This far exceeded a milestone that scientists consider rapid intensity: an increase of 35 mph in 24 hours.

“It's unusual that it went from a tropical storm to a Category 5 hurricane in less than two days,” said Kartik Balaguru, a climate scientist at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory.

Jonathan Lin, an atmospheric scientist at Cornell University who specializes in hurricane forecasting and modeling, called Milton “one of the fastest-strengthening hurricanes we've ever seen in the Atlantic.” There is.

The hurricane's wind speeds exceeded 175 miles per hour, unprecedented for an October storm. Milton is the strongest Gulf hurricane since Hurricane Rita in 2005.

new eyewall

In the Northern Hemisphere, hurricanes wrap counterclockwise around a central, mostly cloudless eye.

Bands of rain began falling outside of Milton Monday night into Tuesday. These storms merged to form a second ring, creating a replacement eyewall and tripling the radius where maximum wind speeds were recorded, Slocum said.

This phenomenon, known as eyewall displacement, typically causes storms to widen but reduce wind speeds somewhat, and it happened to Milton. As the storm develops, it may occur several times. Once this process is complete, and conditions permit, the hurricane may begin to gain strength again.

“You can think of it as molting. Once it molts, it can intensify again. That's exactly what we saw in Milton,” Lin said.

wobble

According to the National Hurricane Center, Milton “wobbled” Tuesday afternoon, changing its expected path and moving its expected landfall south.

Wobble results from instability due to complex mechanics inside the eyeball.

Lin explained the dynamics of a hurricane by comparing it to a top or a dreidel.

“Sometimes you'll see the top spinning. If you push it a little bit or give it a little push, it wobbles a little bit and then it starts spinning again,” Lin said. “It redirects itself.”

Large shakes can change the course of the storm and determine which locations receive the brunt of the hurricane.

Forecasters are expecting storm surge of up to 13 feet. If the storm were to change course slightly to the south, it could avoid the worst of the flooding in especially vulnerable Tampa Bay. In 2017, Hurricane Irma changed course to the east, helping Tampa Bay avoid a predicted storm surge of more than 12 feet.

Once the storm reaches the coast, areas south of Milton's Eye should experience strong wind gusts, pushing water onto shore and resulting in storm surge.

That's because of the angle at which the storm approaches the Florida peninsula and the counterclockwise rotation of the winds around its center.

what happens next

Milton weakened during her final approach to the Florida Peninsula. The main reason for this is that they encountered vertical wind shear, which refers to changes in wind speed and direction in the upper layers of the atmosphere.

But Lin said, “That doesn't make it any less dangerous.”

Even with weaker winds, Milton is expected to remain a major hurricane until it makes landfall Wednesday night.

After landing, it is expected to cross the peninsula and head out to sea. The time on land robs the storm of the energy it draws from the ocean's heat, and the storm will weaken rapidly, just as the coma slows down, Lin said.

break the eerie silence

A new report from the World Weather Attribution Group on Hurricane Helen, which made landfall in Florida on September 26, shows that climate change has caused the storm's wind speeds to increase by 11% and total precipitation to increase by approximately It was found that there was a high possibility of an increase of 10%.

Researchers said they expect Milton to behave similarly, but even worse because of climate change.

Warmer-than-normal ocean conditions in the North Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico and the emergence of a hurricane-related La Niña weather pattern led forecasters to predict a very active hurricane season this spring.

But even in mid-September, the typical peak of hurricane activity, the season remained eerily quiet, leaving researchers perplexed, despite the ocean heat that fuels hurricanes. , making us wonder if their positive predictions were wrong.

The eerie calm was broken in late September as Hurricanes Helen and Milton roared into view. If Milton makes landfall, it will be the second-highest number of hurricane landfalls in a year on the Gulf Coast.

“This makes 2024 the second-highest number of Gulf hurricane landfalls on record, along with 2005 and 2020, after 1886,” meteorologist Philip Klotzbach said. I wrote to X.