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The Neglected Climatic Hazards of the Caribbean: Overview and Prospects in a Warmer Climate
Author(s) -
Gamble Douglas
Publication year - 2014
Publication title -
geography compass
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.587
H-Index - 65
ISSN - 1749-8198
DOI - 10.1111/gec3.12125
Subject(s) - orographic lift , tropical cyclone , climatology , storm , precipitation , environmental science , climate change , tropics , geography , thunderstorm , african easterly jet , tropical cyclone rainfall forecasting , tropical wave , meteorology , cyclone (programming language) , oceanography , geology , ecology , field programmable gate array , computer science , computer hardware , biology
The Caribbean is a region that experiences a wide range of climatic hazards: tropical waves, tropical cyclones, frontal storms, convective thunderstorms, and meteorological drought. Despite the influence of all of these climatic hazards on the Caribbean region, one climatic hazard, tropical cyclones (including tropical depressions, tropical storms, and hurricanes), dominates the hazards research and literature with little attention given to the other climatic hazards (non‐tropical heavy rains, orographic precipitation, and meteorological drought). The purpose of this review article is to address such a bias in the literature by providing an overview of Caribbean climatic hazards not related to tropical cyclones (non‐tropical storms, orographic precipitation, and meteorological drought) and discuss the potential impact of climate change upon these hazards. Because the impact of a future warm climate is not limited to tropical cyclones alone, mitigation and adaption efforts should strive to address the entire spectrum of Caribbean climatic hazards.