Tropical cyclones (TCs) cause severe coastal flooding in the middle latitudes. While the IPCC Fifth Assessment Reports (AR5, 2013) have focused on mean sea-level rise, recent advances (e.g., IPCC Sixth Assessment Reports, AR6, 2021) have shown the importance of storm surges and wave changes in extreme water levels causing coastal flooding. Both TC intensity and track changes are linked to future changes in extreme storm surges and wave climates in middle latitudes. This brief review summarizes historical and future long-term changes in extreme water levels, the contribution of increased storm surges, and wave height by the monitoring data and climate projections. In addition, several examples of impact assessment of storm surges and extreme wave changes are presented.

The intensely active 2017 Atlantic basin hurricane season provided an opportunity to examine how climate drivers, including warming oceans and rising seas, exacerbated tropical cyclone hazards. The season also highlighted the unique vulnerabilities of populations residing on Small Island Developing States (SIDS) to the catastrophic potential of these storms. During 2017, 22 of the 29 Caribbean SIDS were affected by at least one named storm, and multiple SIDS experienced extreme damage. This paper aims to review the multiplicity of storm impacts on Caribbean SIDS throughout the 2017 season, to explicate the influences of climate drivers on storm formation and intensity, to explore the propensity of SIDS to sustain severe damage and prolonged disruption of essential services, to document the spectrum of public health consequences, and to delineate the daunting hurdles that challenged emergency response and recovery operations for island-based, disaster-affected populations. (Disaster Med Public Health Preparedness. 2019;13:5–17)

Stratigraphy, geochemistry and radiocarbon dating of a succession of sediment in the Santiaguillo Basin (central-northern Mexico) help reconstruct the millennial-scale dynamics of hydrological variability that occurred in the southern part of western subtropical North America since the late last glacial. Runoff was generally above average during the late last glacial from ~ 27 to 18 ka. Following this interval, runoff decreased and deposition of authigenic carbonate and aeolian transported sediment increased until ~ 4 ka. Heinrich 1 and 2, and Younger Dryas were intervals of reduced runoff and increased aeolian activity. The wetter climate of central-northern Mexico and arid conditions in north–northwestern Mexico during the late last glacial were probably related to formation of tropical cyclones in the eastern North Pacific during the autumn with restricted rainfall swaths and an absent/weaker North American Monsoon. Enhanced North American Monsoon and tropical cyclones with expanded rainfall swaths brought more summer and autumn precipitation to a broader region extending from the central-northern Mexico to the continental interiors of southwestern US during the early Holocene.

What factors are related to establishment dynamics following disturbance in late-successional versus second-growth tropical forests of the Pacific islands? Are those relationships robust to interannual fluctuations in establishment? In three sites juveniles were enumerated in 30 (5 × 5-m) subplots within 45 × 50-m tree plots in 2004 and 2005, 2.5 and 3.5 y following a Category-3 tropical cyclone (hurricane), in the Vava'u Island Group, Kingdom of Tonga. Recruitment was almost three-fold greater in the second sample period. Spatial pattern of focal species density was related to density of other juveniles, proximity of conspecific adults and canopy cover in the two years using Seemingly Unrelated Regression. Shade-tolerant species were the most abundant recruits in late-successional sites, establishing near-conspecific adults and other juveniles, while shade-establishing species were recruiting in gaps in second-growth forest where they also constitute the canopy trees. This pattern, observed in both years, reinforces divergent successional trajectories for second-growth and late-successional forest.

On 31 December 2001, Tropical Cyclone Waka passed directly over the Vava'u island group, Kingdom of Tonga, with sustained and maximum wind speeds of 185 km h−1 and 230 km h−1 respectively. During a prior study of forest secondary succession, 44 forest plots on 13 islands had been surveyed in 1995 and their locations marked. Nineteen of the plots were resurveyed and two additional transects established in May–June 2002, 6 mo following the cyclone. Cyclone-related tree mortality averaged 6%, varied from 0–7% for lowland late-successional species, and tended to be higher for early successional plots (8–16%) and species (4–19%). Severe damage (uprooting, snapped stems) affected 25% of the 2030 stems measured. The proportion of snapped stems was disproportionately high in the 10–15-cm stem diameter class. Uprooting was more prevalent than expected by chance among larger trees (>20 cm diameter). The greatest mortality and severe damage (combined,>35% of stems) occurred in plots that were early successional. Over the 6 y prior to the storm, background recruitment and mortality averaged 1.4% and 3.3% respectively. Mortality was greater than recruitment, while basal area was increasing, in most plots that had not experienced additional anthropogenic disturbance.