With Climate Change, Smaller Storms Are Growing More Fearsome, More Often

 It has been raining a lot in New York, which hasn’t seen a September this wet in over a century. Climate change is very likely stoking more ominous and lengthy downpours because as the atmosphere heats up, it can hold more moisture, said Andrew J. Kruczkiewicz, a senior researcher who specializes in flash floods at Columbia Climate School at Columbia University.

This simple fact is the most probable explanation for why the Northeast has been so soggy, said Greg Carbin, chief of forecast operations at the National Weather Service’s Weather Prediction Center. “Low-pressure systems like nor’easters now have greater amounts of water vapor available to them,” he said. “And with a warmer Atlantic Ocean combining with warmer air, the atmosphere is primed to produce more rainfall.”