Hurricane Otis, which made landfall Wednesday near Acapulco, Mexico, appears to be part of a recent global trend of near-land rapidly intensifying hurricanes, said Shuai Wang, assistant professor of geography and spatial sciences at the University of Delaware.
This storm, which intensified from a tropical storm into a ferocious Category 5 hurricane in under 24 hours, is a very extreme case, Dr. Wang said.
"There is a very short time window for preparedness, or to even release a warning," he said. "It's almost impossible to evacuate people."
Dr. Wang authored a paper on the topic that was published in Nature Communications on Aug. 24, days before another rapidly intensifying storm, Hurricane Idalia, made landfall in Northern Florida.
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