How rare was the 2016–2022 tropical cyclone activity near the Caribbean coasts of Nicaragua and Costa Rica?

Tropical cyclones (TC) are one of the synoptic systems that most affect Central America, from late spring to northern autumn, because they cause many direct and indirect impacts on the isthmus. Observational data of hurricane tracks and a suite of 10 downscaled General Circulation Models from the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project round 3 and a Large Ensemble Global Simulation along with off-line TC trajectory generation and tracking algorithms in the Atlantic/Caribbean basin were used in a detection and attribution study to determine if the observed run of 8 cyclonic events in 7 years (2016–2022) near the coasts of Nicaragua and Costa Rica, could be unequivocally attributed to anthropogenic climate change. The results showed there is a large model to model variability, but that although the event is rare, it could not be proved that anthropogenic forcings have increased the probabilities of this high run of cyclones considering the 95% confidence level. More studies are needed to determine the exact time of possible emergence of a stronger signal in the near future.