HURRICANE SANDY

Hurricane Sandy was a tropical cyclone that devastated portions of the Caribbean, Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern United States in late October 2012. The eighteenth named storm and tenth hurricane of the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season, Sandy was the largest Atlantic hurricane on record, as measured by diameter, with winds spanning 1,100 miles. Sandy is estimated in early calculations to have caused damage of at least $20 billion. Preliminary estimates of losses that include business interruption surpass $50 billion, which, if confirmed, would make it the second-costliest Atlantic hurricane in history, behind only Hurricane Katrina.
Sandy developed from a tropical wave in the western Caribbean Sea on October 22, quickly
After briefly weakening to a tropical storm, Sandy re-intensified into a hurricane, and on October 28 an eye began redeveloping. The storm moved around an upper-level low over the eastern United States and also to the southwest of a ridge over Atlantic Canada, turning it to the northwest. Sandy reached a secondary peak of 90 mph on October 29, around which time it had a wind diameter of over 1,000 nautical miles. The convection diminished while the hurricane accelerated toward the New Jersey coast, and the hurricane was no longer tropical by 2300 UTC on October 29. An hour later, Sandy made landfall about 5 miles southwest of Atlantic City, with winds of 90 mph. The remnants weakened over Pennsylvania, degenerating into a remnant trough on October 31.
According to Kevin E. Trenberth of the National Center for Atmospheric Research, "natural variability and weather has provided the perhaps optimal conditions of a hurricane running into extra-tropical conditions to make for a huge intense storm, enhanced by global warming influences." Unusually warm ocean surface temperatures contributed to the size and strength of the storm, and the storm lingered due to a strong blocking pattern. According to their analysis, global warming is expected to continue to increase ocean surface temperatures and the frequency of blocking patterns in the future. Mark Fischetti of Scientific American proposed a more