Hurricane Beryl laid waste to communities – even whole islands – as it barrelled through the Caribbean over the past week. Never has such a powerful Atlantic hurricane arrived this early in the year: the ocean is usually too cool.

Smaller islands like Carriacou and Petite Martinique (population: 10,500) and Union Island (population: 3,000) have been decimated. Even those islands that did not receive the full brunt still suffered severe damage to infrastructure, homes, tourism and the fishing industry.

The worst may be yet to come. Five months remain of “a hyperactive hurricane season” with Atlantic temperatures at record highs. Beryl’s timing and severity imply a very long few months of torment for Caribbean people and some climate scientists predict between four and seven major storms of category 3 or more.

But even this “extraordinary” season may become somewhat ordinary by the middle or the end of the century. Beryl is, in this sense, a disturbing harbinger of what is to come as global sea-surface temperatures keep rising.

As a group, the world’s 57 “small island developing states”, about half of which are found in the Caribbean, contribute less........

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