https://phys.org/news/2018-10-hurricane-michael-approached-landfall.html

"This is definitely not normal," Jiang said. "The environment has been somewhat favorable, but not consistently favorable. Although the sea surface temperature in the Gulf has been warmer than the average, the shear was high initially which led to a gradual, instead of rapid, intensification forecast by the National Hurricane Center until the shear decreased Monday morning."

The problem is that rapid intensification is unpredictable. With her research, Jiang hopes to change that.