texas a&m storm expert: minor hurricanes are still capable of major damagemay 31 2017with hurricane season starting june 1 its interesting to note that the united states has now gone 12 years – the longest period on record – without a major hurricane making landfall but thats a bit deceiving because if its one thing weve learned in recent years is that it doesnt take a major hurricane to cause major damage says a texas a&m university severe storms expertrobert korty associate professor in the department of atmospheric sciences at texas a&m notes that its a combination of pure luck and favorable weather conditions that have prevented a category 3 storm (winds of at least 111 miles per hour) from striking the us hurricane wilma was the last to hit and the category 3 storm pummeled the florida and the southeast on oct 24 2005 on average the houston-galveston area gets hit by a major storm every 15 years its mainly the luck of the draw korty explains weve been pretty lucky ever since the mid-2000s when there were so many storms that made landfall especially around 2004 to 2005 weve had some strong el niños (warmer than usual waters in the central pacific ocean that tend to influence weather patterns around the world) and its true that when those occur storms are a less likely to form in the atlantic but last years el niño has weakened considerably we will have to watch and see what develops over the next couple of months in 2005 much of the gulf coast area was devastated by a series of storms that included dennis katrina rita and wilma those combined storms killed more than 4 000 people and caused more than $150 billion in damages and its the only year on record when four major hurricanes hit the us but a storm doesnt have to be major to be deadly texans will never forget hurricane ike which killed 74 people in the state caused $30 billion in damage and ruined the lives of thousands and it was only a category 2 storm when it hit on sept 13 of 2008 likewise residents of the east coast will never forget superstorm sandy in 2012 which barely made hurricane status as it formed in the caribbean and skirted numerous atlantic states and eventually killed over 230 people in eight countries before causing $75 billion in damage the second costliest storm in us history behind katrina if you look at the number of hurricanes that form around the world its been pretty close to average over the last 10 years or so korty says weve had several storms in recent years that have not been especially intense but they have created a lot of damage especially coastal flooding in many areas hurricane matthew last year is a good example it formed as a category 5 storm in the lower caribbean and then weakened before it skirted the coast of georgia florida and the carolinas in 2016 and did all sorts of damage i think the message is that we have to pay attention to every storm that forms and see how it develops even the smaller storms can be devastating by keith randall texas a&m university marketing and communications ### this story is posted on texas a&m today media contact: robert korty at (979) 847-9090 or korty@tamuedu or robyn blackmon communications manager at (979) 845-6324 or robynblackmon@tamu or keith randall news & information services at (979) 845-4644 or keith-randall@tamuedu texans will never forget hurricane ike which killed 74 people in the state caused $30 billion in damage and ruined the lives of thousands and it was only a category 2 storm when it hit on sept 13 of 2008 (credit: noaa environmental visualization laboratory)