Climate change is making the East Coast more vulnerable to the scariest kinds of hurricanes, according to a new study that found rapidly intensifying storms will become a bigger threat as the planet warms.

The research, which was published recently in the journal Nature, says that a bubble of cooler ocean temperatures and lofty crosswinds that protect the East Coast when hurricanes are most active in the Atlantic's main development region will erode if greenhouse gas emissions continue at the current rate.

The study builds on 2017 findings by climate scientist James Kossin of the National Centers for Environmental Information. In the recent report, Kossin worked with scientists Mingfang Ting and Suzana Camargo, of Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.

"We have been very lucky to have this natural barrier in place for decades, maybe even forever, and if we start to erode it, we are very clearly going to be increasing the risk at the coast," Kossin said.

(function(d,s,id){var js,fjs=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];if(d.getElementById(id))return;js=d.createElement(s);js.id=id;js.src='https://embed.playbuzz.com/sdk.js';fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js,fjs);}(document,'script','playbuzz-sdk'));

The hurricane season that began this month runs through Nov. 30. A lead hurricane forecast from the federal Climate Prediction Center expects this season to be near normal with between nine to 15 named storms and as many as eight hurricanes.

Model simulations of future Atlantic hurricanes show a disruption in the equatorial Pacific's Walker circulation, which is the normal air flow pattern that moves east to west at the surface and west to east at higher altitudes. Natural fluctuations in the circulation are what causes the climate patterns of El Nino and La Nina.

The disruption could mean that when wind shear is light over the tropical Atlantic, increasing activity in the main development region, the protective wind shear barrier over the East Coast won’t be as strong, allowing hurricanes to quickly deepen near the shore.

Rapid intensification is defined as a storm gaining 34 mph or more in 24 hours. It is a challenge to forecast and can prove deadly if it happens near the coast, ramping up a storm's intensity by a category or more in a day.

>> RELATED: The National Hurricane Center still hand plots storm tracks, but millennials are changing that

Kossin said 2016's Hurricane Matthew is an example of how the protective wind shear worked in favor of the East Coast, dropping Matthew's fury from a Category 4 as it approached Florida to a Cat 1 when it made landfall in South Carolina.

Without the shear, Matthew may have remained a Cat 4 or even strengthened, Kossin said.

“Coupled with the robust warming of the ocean surface temperature in the future, it is likely that the U.S. East Coast will experience unprecedented hurricane intensification in the future, causing even greater threats to the coastal community,” notes the study, which is titled Past and Future Hurricane Intensity Change along the U.S. East Coast.

It is generally believed that the Atlantic Basin has been in an active period for hurricanes since the mid-1990s.

>> RELATED: Why some say the Saffir-Simpson hurricane scale is outdated and should be replaced

While there was an 11-year lull in hurricanes making landfall in Florida after 2005, Hurricane Hermine picked up the pace when it hit the coast near Tallahassee in 2016. Then 2017 and 2018 more than made up the difference in the Sunshine State and beyond.

Three Category 4 storms hit the U.S. and Puerto Rico in 2017. Last season saw Category 5 Hurricane Michael devastate the Florida Panhandle and Hurricane Florence send flooding rains and storm surge into North Carolina.

"I don't think we were surprised by the findings, but we didn't know what to expect," said Camargo about the recent study. "For a hurricane to intensify, several things have to be working together, so to have one making it more conducive for intensification is a concern."

The Gulf Coast is unlikely to be affected by the changes in vertical wind shear, but the East Coast could begin feeling the impacts of quick-intensity hurricanes by 2050 under the worse-case scenario of carbon emissions remaining unchanged.

“How human activity may contribute to hurricane intensity change in the future, particularly land-falling hurricanes, is thus an extremely urgent question for society at large,” the study notes. “Our results emphasize the potential threat that hurricanes may become more intense in the future as they move toward the East Coast of the United States.”