The wild weather year that was 2024 finally ended with a parting outbreak of deadly tornadoes, but researchers will be tallying the total costs for months to come.

The year finished as one of the roughest in recent history for weather-related disasters, with the U.S. being pummeled by five landfalling hurricanes and a stream of atmospheric rivers, heat waves and droughts. That final burst of twisters is expected to make 2024 the second worst year on record for tornadoes across the nation.

As of Dec. 31, the National Weather Service tallied 1,855 preliminary tornado reports, including 90 in December. That number will drop and the final verified numbers aren’t expected until March 1, said Harold Brooks, a senior scientist at the National Severe Storms Laboratory in Norman, Oklahoma. However, the final total is expected to be more than 1,700 tornadoes.

That would top every other year on record except 2004, when 1,817 tornadoes were confirmed, according to weather service data. The other worst tornado years on record were the 1,692 in 2008 and the 1,691 in 2011.

“We just never really got a break,” said Victor Gensini, an associate professor of meteorology and severe weather at Northern Illinois University. “There was never a significant lull in activity.”

“This (2024) will be the highest year for insured losses for severe convective storms – including hail, wind and tornadoes – by a large margin,” Gensini said.

“We didn’t have the really large outbreaks that produced hundreds of tornadoes on a single day, he said. “We had a lot of smaller active days that aggregated day by day.”

At least 50 people died. The annual average number of deaths since 2000 is about 72.

Tornadoes in 2024

Oklahoma, known for its tornadoes historically, had its worst year on record with 152 confirmed twisters, the weather service confirmed.

“In general, if Oklahoma is having a record year, that says something about the country,” Gensini said.

At least four other states broke their previous record for tornadoes in a single year. At least 45 deaths were attributed to tornadoes.

Ohio’s 74 tornadoes broke a record set in 1992 at 62. West Virginia set a new record, with 21 tornadoes, the weather service said. That broke the previous record, set in 1998, when 14 tornadoes were confirmed. Iowa also set a record, with 125 tornadoes, five more than the previous record.

Indiana saw its second busiest year for tornadoes, with 57, the weather service reported.

The 90 preliminary tornado reports across the country in December continue a trend documented over the past 30 or 40 years, he said. “The increasing trend in the South and Southeast is something that’s been increasing, especially in the cool season.”

The 65 preliminary tornado reports across the South on Dec. 28 made it the third busiest day this year.

The most active day for tornado reports was April 26, 2024, when a series of storms across the U.S. produced more than 100 tornadoes, including at least 25 tornado tracks across Nebraska and Iowa, according to weather service data.

The plethora of tornado activity also provided a prolific year for storm chasers to document and photograph tornadoes, he said. “Even as we moved into the time of year that we expected to see things start ramping down, Milton produced EF-3 tornadoes in Florida that looked like they were out of western Kansas or the Great Plains.”

What caused so many storms?

A particularly active jet stream, the transition from the El Niño weather pattern in the Pacific Ocean to more neutral conditions and an exceptionally warm Gulf of Mexico have been credited with causing so much of the rough weather.

“When you look back in history and you’re phasing out of an El NIño and going to neutral, those years are average to above average,” Gensini said.

The Gulf of Mexico played a particular role in the cooler months, he said. “When you have a record warm Gulf of Mexico, it’s a lot easier to transport the warm humid air that causes these types of storm events.”

Hurricanes in 2024

Dozens of tornadoes occurred as Hurricane Beryl and Hurricane Milton moved over land.

When Hurricane Beryl made landfall in Matagorda, Texas and its remnants moved through the northeastern U.S., it produced at least 65 tornadoes, killing at least two people. Weather service offices in Shreveport, Louisiana and Buffalo, New York set daily records for tornado warnings as the storm moved through.

Milton produced a string of more than 41 tornadoes across Florida, killing at least six people.

In total, the Atlantic hurricane season produced 18 named storms and 11 hurricanes, including the five that made landfall on the mainland. An average season produces 14 names storms and seven hurricanes.

The deaths of at least 335 people we attributed to hurricanes, making 2024 the deadliest hurricane season in the continental U.S. since 2005.

Wildfires in 2024

According to the National Interagency Fire Center through New Years Eve, last year was the seventh worst wildfire season in 40 years in terms of the number of acres burned. More than 8.8 million acres were burned over during 61,685 reported wildfires.

While the number of wildfires in the country has been trending generally downward, the number of acres burned in those fires has trended upward, with the average number of acres burned at more than 7 million acres a year since 2020.

Experts attribute the growth in large wildfires to several factors, including land management practices, a lack of prescribed burning, an increasing amount of sprawling development in rural areas and warming temperatures.

Tornado risks increasing

Gensini was a co-author on a study published earlier this year that concluded changes in storm patterns and human activities have greatly increased the nation’s vulnerability and risks when it comes tornadoes, especially in the eastern half of the nation.

In the South, there’s a triple threat, the study found.

“A changing climate is creating more favorable conditions for the storms that spawn tornadoes, more people than ever are moving into the region and the most vulnerable people, including the elderly and poverty-stricken, are becoming even more vulnerable,” study co-author Stephen Strader, a hazards geographer and meteorologist at Villanova University, told YSL News.