Hurricanes Just Happen

Earlier this week as Hannah set her sites on the Southeastern coast, my ten year old asked why God creates hurricanes. He wondered why God could create such storms and allow loss of life as a result. I told him that hurricanes were part of life and were not specifically caused by God. They were expected to happen just like rain and wind. Plus, we should think of God during such storms because they remind us of his might and strength as the creator of Earth. He accepted the answers and moved on to better topics such as his fantasy football league.

So he learned that hurricanes will happen. They are just a part of nature. If he could follow me, I would tell him that there are few certainties in life-death, taxes, and the fact that everything varies. Nothing stays the same. But things vary according to normal and abnormal patterns of behavior. Our body temperature varies throughout the day but should average 98.6. If something abnormal occurs (a virus), the temperature spikes high. This spike is a clear signal that something has changed in our human system.

If what I say is correct, Mother Nature should have a normal pattern of behavior regarding hurricanes. Graph One shows the number of hurricanes to strike the US mainland by decade from 1851-1860 to 1900-2000. The two horizontal lines above and below the dots represent the boundaries between what we expect to happen and not to happen. Based on this data, we expect, within a decade, to have at least eight and at most twenty eight hurricanes with eighteen as the average. Overall, the behavior seems to be random and not driven by special causes or forces. If special causes existed, we would see evidence on the chart such as an extremely high number or a gradual increase (or decrease) in the number of hurricanes.

Graph Two shows the number of Atlantic hurricanes by year from 1978 to 2007. Based on this data, we can expect, on average, six hurricanes per year and up to fourteen hurricanes in a given year. 2005 was a significantly high year. It exceeded the boundary of expectation. Remove that year and Mother Nature’s behavior was pretty random. Nothing special seemed to drive the behavior.

This is not a statement about global warming. It is more a cautionary statement of the cause and effect relationships that exist in the world. I’ve always been trained to prove cause and effect with experimentation. It is tricky to look at what has happened and draw absolute conclusions on an occurrence and the causes of the occurrence. Sometimes, we should accept the fact that things happen as part of the ebb and flow of life and there will be good times and bad times within the context.

I just wish I had felt this way during my ten hour escape from Hurricane Floyd with a screaming newborn in the back seat and an overheated engine threatening to halt me on the back roads of the Lowcountry.