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Hurricanes are tremendously dangerous to lives and property, par2cularly when they approach land. In the Atlan2c, hurricanes go through periods of higherand lower-thannormal ac2vity, and these periods can last 30 years or more. For example, we have been in an ac2ve period since around 1995, and before that we were in a quiet period since around the late 1960s. Quite a lot of prior research has focused on this up-and-down behavior of Atlan2c hurricane ac2vity and has found that it is controlled by upand-down changes in the tropical environment (between the equator and about 23°N la2tude). For example, when tropical ocean temperatures are warmer than usual, there is greater hurricane ac2vity because warmer water provides more energy for storms to form and strengthen. Similarly, when there is less ver2cal wind shear, hurricanes are more likely to form and intensify. Ver2cal wind shear describes the way wind changes with height. Hurricanes don't like shear because it "pushes them over", making them less efficient. They are most efficient when they stand ver2cally straight from the surface all the way to the boWom of the stratosphere (up to 60,000 feet or more). So we know that when the oceans are warm and the shear is low in the tropics, there is usually greater hurricane ac2vity. And vice versa. But this only tells us about overall, or basin-wide, Atlan2c ac2vity. Could there be regional differences in this behavior within the Atlan2c as a whole? Our research was mo2vated by this ques2on. We wanted to go beyond how the condi2ons in the tropics vary, and explore whether the up-and-down changes might have pa/erns of change associated with them, and whether hurricanes are affected by these paWerns. Another way to phrase this ques2on is: do warmer oceans and lower shear in the tropics affect hurricane risk in the same way for a person who lives on a Caribbean Island versus someone living, for instance, near the South Carolina coast. We used an analysis technique that emphasizes "paWerns of variability", known as principal component analysis, and we applied this technique to the historical records of ocean temperatures and shear in the Atlan2c Ocean from 1948 to 2015. When we did this, two "centers of ac2on" emerged. One was an elongated region confined to the tropics (from the equator to about 23°N la2tude) and spanning from the west coast of Africa, through the Caribbean, to the east coast of Mexico. The other was a circular "bulls-eye" region just off the east coasts of Florida and the Carolinas. The most interes2ng thing about these two regions is that they behave in perfect opposi2on to each other. That is, when one is high the other is low, and vice versa. So what does this mean? It means that when the ocean temperatures and ver2cal wind shear in the tropics are favorable for hurricanes to develop and strengthen, they are unfavorable near the U.S. east coast. And when the condi2ons are more hos2le to hurricanes in the tropics, they are more friendly to hurricanes approaching the U.S. coast. So the climate system actually provides a barrier of sorts that protects the coast from hurricane threats during periods when the basin-wide ac2vity is at its greatest. Another way to say this is that when Mother Nature encourages lots of hurricanes to form and strengthen in the tropics, she also tends to slam the door on them if they come near the U.S. coast. On the other hand, during the quiet 1:NOAA's Center for Weather and Climate, USA

The climate's barrier to coastal hurricanes