AUSTIN (KXAN) -- Hurricane Milton is moving through the western Gulf of Mexico. It is headed to the central west coast of Florida with landfall late Wednesday night/very early Thursday morning. This is on the heels of devastating Hurricane Helene which struck the Florida coast at 10:10 p.m. Sept. 26. Top sustained winds were estimated at 140 mph, a Category 4 hurricane. The death toll and the incomprehensible damage are staggering. We have talked a lot in our weathercasts about the incredible increase in strength this storm went through during its pilgrimage through the Gulf. Helene was the fourth landfalling hurricane this year. Milton will be the fifth. Will Milton roar into the history books as Helene did? Why did Helene undergo such a dramatic change? Did climate change have any effect on the storm? The answer is a resounding likely. For starters, climate change makes the strongest hurricanes stronger. Hurricanes take heat out of the ocean. That heat is converted to the kinetic energy of their winds. The warmer/hotter the ocean the more powerful these hurricanes get. Taking the heat from the ocean joins low wind shear and a moist atmosphere as other contributing factors. The present temperatures in the Gulf waters, according to NOAA's Coral Reef Watch, are nearly 2 to 4°F warmer than the long-term average. The heat is there. The hurricane taps into that heat to make it stronger. The second effect of the changing climate is the increase in rainfall. Global warming increases the rate at which ocean water evaporates into the air. This adds to the amount of water vapor the atmosphere contains when the air is fully saturated. As the ocean temperature warms, so does the amount of water vapor in saturated air. This will cause an increase in the amount of rain that is dumped over an area. As more water vapor is pulled in the more rain will fall. Let's go back seven years to Hurricane Harvey, a classic example of how an increase in water vapor led to rain dumped in southeast Texas. It was the greatest rainfall ever from a tropical weather system with amounts exceeding 30 to 50 inches in the Houston area up to that astronomical 60.59" that was measured in Nederland. Harvey was the second costliest weather-related tropical cyclone in our country's history at approximately $160 billion. That data went into some studies that show that human-caused global warming does, indeed, lead to extreme heavy rain events. Third up on this list is the increased storm surge damage because of sea level increase. Hurricane Helene set records at three tide gauges in Cedar Key, Clearwater Beach, and St. Petersburg. Human-caused global warming is looked at as the reason. Remember, we are talking about how the global sea level increase in the last 125 years is more than seven inches. Why? It's no secret that glaciers are melting. It's also no secret that water expands when it is heated. Studies are showing a sea level rise increase along Florida's west coast, including, according to a study, 2.3' per century at St. Petersburg. As changes occur in ocean circulation and wind patterns, along with the effects of our changing climate, the accelerated sea level rise increases dramatically. We know that global warming is nothing new. In this area of sea level rises, the following tide gauges show that Hurricane Helene ranks first in the Top 10 water levels at three locations. The highest water level at Ste. Petersburg was 6.31'. The third was 3.8' from Hurricane Idalia in August 2023. At Cedar Key, Hurricane Helene made for the highest water level there at 9.3". And at Clearwater Beach, the increase in the water level was 6.67". The thought here is that an increase in water level, particularly in a coastal area, will lead directly lead to flooding so long as the rise is high enough to affect normally dry land.  Perhaps the most important effect climate change has on these tropical storms/hurricanes is how rapidly they strengthen. Hurricane Helene joined Hurricane Harvey and others in getting increasingly stronger just before landfall. The danger here is the unpredictability they cause for emergency management officials when it comes to evacuation efforts. It's just as bad for forecasters who might get caught off guard. It's not hard to believe that many might have, if not were, caught off guard when Helene went from a Category 1 to a Category 4 hurricane, based on information from the National Hurricane Center, in less than 24 hours. Researchers suggest this increase in intensity can be explained by what some are doing to the environment. And, it's as simple as this: when carbon-based materials are burned, carbon dioxide is released into the atmosphere. CO2 is a greenhouse gas. It traps the sun's heat leading to a warming planet. Temperatures are increasing. Human activities, including burning fossil fuels, lead to a stronger greenhouse effect leading to a warming globe. Records from 1950 to the present show that Hurricane Helene intensified by at least 40 mph in the 24 hours before landfall, making it just one of ten historical storms to do so. Human-made climate change will ultimately be the reason we will continue to see these massive storms continue to wreak havoc on our coasts and inland. The history is there. If nothing changes, these powerful hurricanes likely will only get worse.