NARRATOR: It may have been the ultimate force of nature.
The hypercane, a compact mega storm just a fraction the size
of a hurricane, but theorized to pack a punch never seen before.
Could hypercanes have been responsible for killing
75% of all life on Earth?
The hypercane may be a theory, but is there
evidence that this superstorm even existed?
The place to look can be found all around the world--
a 1-inch layer of sediment, which has become the key
to understanding what some scientists consider the world's
largest crime scene.
In the K-T boundary lies the physical evidence
of an asteroid strike over 65 million years ago.
But does the K-T boundary also hold
clues to suggest hypercanes formed after the impact?
KERRY EMANUEL: Well, that's a really excellent question,
and we've given some thought to that.
Can we find proxy evidence for hypercanes
in the geological record?
JEFF KIEHL: It's possible to get some idea of where
these hypercanes would have been impacting the coastal regions,
and then to go and look if the geologic record is there,
to find some signature of those events.
NARRATOR: One possible signature could
be the fuel that fires the engine
of a hypercane-- saltwater.
Warm ocean water is the key to a hypercane's power.
Could the salt from the ocean have left
marks in the geological record?
KERRY EMANUEL: The interesting thing, of course,
is that you would ingest a lot of salt into a hypercane.
Now, the salt that goes up into the stratosphere
may not come back down as raindrops,
and it might get spread globally and come back down.
NARRATOR: But even if an elevated salt
content could be found, important questions
still linger.
KIRK JOHNSON: The challenge, I think,
would be how do you separate the deposits of a hypercane
from the deposits of a tidal wave?
NARRATOR: Even Professor Kerry Emanuel
realizes the chances of finding definitive proof are slim.
The problem with salt is it tends to get
dissolved and washed away.
It might have happened.
Whether it gets preserved in the geological record, I think,
is somewhat dubious.
NARRATOR: Science has yet to find the one
telltale factor that could distinguish a hypercane
in the geologic record.
And although the evidence for hypercanes remains elusive,
the question becomes, could hypercanes
and other superstorms be part of our future?
Warm ocean waters are the key ingredient
to forming hypercanes and hurricanes,
and many scientists see more severe hurricanes
as a reality to come.
KERRY EMANUEL: As the world warms up,
the potential for stronger hurricanes increases.
So one plausible scenario is you actually have fewer hurricanes.
But the few that you did get, some of them
would be very strong, stronger than hurricanes today.
NARRATOR: But determining which hurricanes will become killers
and which ones won't is still an elusive art.
In fact, scientists don't know exactly what
makes some storms form into hurricanes and others
simply fade away.
We're very good now at tracking where hurricanes are
going to go, but still challenged at determining how
strong they're going to get.
What is that "it" factor?
We can't do hurricanes in a laboratory.
We have to build computer models.
Those of us even who do computer modeling
aren't terribly confident about those models
unless they can be compared rigorously with nature.
NARRATOR: It may be impossible to recreate
a fully-formed hurricane in a lab,
but at the University of Miami, Brian Haus is using new tools
to observe the dynamics that occur
between the ocean and the atmosphere during hurricanes.
If ocean temperatures are getting warmer each year,
this research could help determine which
hurricanes in the future have the potential
to explode in force.
The tank can create winds of up to 134 miles per hour, leading
to realistic hurricane conditions that can be tracked
in a controlled atmosphere.
Those winds that we can generate here
will interact with the water surface in the same way
that the winds in a hurricane will interact
with the water surface.
We can look at detail at where the air
and water meet and learn about how things
move across that boundary.
NARRATOR: The boundary between the wind and the waves
is where heat transfer and friction take place--
key components to determining a hurricane's strength.
The lab experiments have led Brian
Haus to a new conclusion about how intense hurricanes form.
BRIAN HAUS: It used to be thought that the friction
increased in a certain way, very, very quickly
with-- as the winds increased.
And what we've been able to measure here
is showing that that's true up to a certain point,
and then the ocean surface becomes actually
flattened by the strong winds.
NARRATOR: A flattened ocean surface
leads to less friction and an eye-opening outcome
for Brian Haus.
BRIAN HAUS: That's been an important result because then
it allows more intense hurricanes to develop than you
might have thought previously.
NARRATOR: These kinds of discoveries
have been made possible by new optical technology.
Lasers and remote sensors allow scientists
to examine the properties of the water
without physically touching it.
BRIAN HAUS: What you see behind me
is a particle image of velocimetry technique
for using laser sheets and particles in the water.
And this is a way that you can map the flow, right up
close to the air-sea interface.
These are little 50 micron particles that we've
placed in the water--
millions of them-- so that we can
track where each little piece of the water is going.
That can then tell you the slope of the surface
at that same point.
And from that height and those slopes,
you can then determine the whole wave
spectrum, the whole characteristics
of the ocean surface.
NARRATOR: Scientists are now beginning a new era
in hurricane research and getting
one step closer to predicting how severe a storm may become.