Last millennium hurricane activity linked to endogenous climate variability.

Despite increased Atlantic hurricane risk, projected trends in hurricane frequency in the warming climate are still highly uncertain, mainly due to short instrumental record that limits our understanding of hurricane activity and its relationship to climate. Here we extend the record to the last millennium using two independent estimates: a reconstruction from sedimentary paleohurricane records and a statistical model of hurricane activity using sea surface temperatures (SSTs). We find statistically significant agreement between the two estimates and the late 20th century hurricane frequency is within the range seen over the past millennium.

A pseudoproxy emulation of the PAGES 2k database using a hierarchy of proxy system models.

Paleoclimate reconstructions are now integral to climate assessments, yet the consequences of using different methodologies and proxy data require rigorous benchmarking. Pseudoproxy experiments (PPEs) provide a tractable and transparent test bed for evaluating climate reconstruction methods and their sensitivity to aspects of real-world proxy networks. Here we develop a dataset that leverages proxy system models (PSMs) for this purpose, which emulates the essential physical, chemical, biological, and geological processes that translate climate signals into proxy records, making these synthetic proxies more relevant to the real world.

A re-appraisal of the ENSO response to volcanism with paleoclimate data assimilation.

The potential for explosive volcanism to affect the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) has been debated since the 1980s. Several observational studies, based largely on tree-ring proxies, have since found support for a positive ENSO phase in the year following large eruptions. In contrast, recent coral data from the heart of the tropical Pacific suggest no uniform ENSO response to explosive volcanism over the last millennium.

Decadal climate variability in the tropical Pacific: Characteristics, causes, predictability, and prospects.

Climate variability in the tropical Pacific affects global climate on a wide range of time scales. On interannual time scales, the tropical Pacific is home to the El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Decadal variations and changes in the tropical Pacific, referred to here collectively as tropical Pacific decadal variability (TPDV), also profoundly affect the climate system.

Response to Comment on "No consistent ENSO response to volcanic forcing over the last millennium".

Robock claims that our analysis fails to acknowledge that pan-tropical surface cooling caused by large volcanic eruptions may mask El Niño warming at our central Pacific site, potentially obscuring a volcano-El Niño connection suggested in previous studies. Although observational support for a dynamical response linking volcanic cooling to El Niño remains ambiguous, Robock raises some important questions about our study that we address here.