The Power of Hurricanes

From Florida and the BBC Weather Centre, the team examines why this year's Atlantic hurricane season has been so active, resulting in deadly consequences.

2017 has seen one of the most powerful and destructive hurricane seasons on record. In this Weather World Hurricane Special the team looks back at Hurricane Harvey's Texas deluge, Irma hitting Cuba as category five storm and Maria's rampage through the Caribbean.

Tomasz Schafernaker reports from Tampa, Florida when Irma struck. He describes what it was like for him, and his team, to safely experience the tropical cyclone.

"When we first arrived in Florida, Hurricane Irma was battering Cuba around 300 miles to the south of us. Even there we could feel the power of the storm, which just showed how big it was," explains Tomasz. "Later, when Irma reached Tampa and my location it had weakened to category two. It's one thing to talk about wind speeds and pressure but it's a completely different thing to experience it first-hand."

Meanwhile, Nick Miller discovers how rock deposits in Caribbean caves can be used to reveal the frequency of hurricanes hundreds of years ago - and what that could mean for our future.

Plus, Sarah Keith-Lucas explains how hurricanes are formed and what the different hurricane categories actually mean.