New data reveals that Hurricane Harvey was much more grievous than previously believed. The hurricane was the worst such storm to hit the US in 12 years, leaving behind a path of destruction and $71 billion dollars in damages. But new research suggests that Harvey was much more sinister than scientists had imagined. Shockingly, scientists believe Harvey may have lingered around the Florida panhandle for days waiting for Hurricane Irma to arrive.

“At first we thought he was just going back out to sea to regain strength,” National Weather Service scientist Julia Phillip stated, “But then we noticed he was shadowing Irma.”

When Irma made landfall she was met by Harvey, in a bathrobe, trying to integrate their storm cells.

The startling discovery has meteorologist’s baffled as they had never known hurricanes to exhibit this type of behavior. But when going back into records, Phillips found this type of behavior repeated frequently when powerful hurricanes crossed paths with weaker ones.

“Any time you have an big, ugly, powerful hurricane, it becomes opportunistic  and will try to take advantage of smaller, weaker systems,” Phillips said, “Oftentimes these instances go unreported because to storms eventually dissipate, only to come back stronger, acting with even more impunity.”

Meterologists have also noticed an even stranger pattern. “Gender classification analysis does seem to show that male storms are far more likely to display this kind of behavior than females,” Phillips added, “And it’s not just hurricanes. Tropical Storm Bill O’Reilly has been exhibiting this behavior for nearly a decade.”