Dear Chris,

We have posted all four of your reviews and responses. Reviewers are generally positive about the manuscript, and find it both interesting and valuable for understanding long-term EC changes. I also want to thank you for prompt responses to reviewers’ comments and taking the initiative to revise the manuscript. The reviewers have all given very helpful comments/suggestions. Please provide point-by-point responses in the next review stage. I am highlighting a few of comments here:
1. The advantage and limitation of basin-wide statistics. One reviewer is unimpressed with the regression using the averaged 90th percentile cyclone depth/precipitation index of the entire North Atlantic (section 4.3). Please do discuss your reasoning and limitation of this strategy, or provide regional analyses in the revised manuscript.
2. The potential dependence of your results to a) definition of windiness of EC, and b) tracking methods. As pointed out by the reviewers, more typically Zappa et al., (2013) definition, and EC tracking methods using PSL (Neu, 2013, IMILAST) seem doable. At least, it would be helpful to include a brief comparison of EC statistics between different definitions and methods for a section of model run, if the results are similar.
3. One reviewer has raised concerns on the robustness and explanation of the large discrepancy in EC numbers between CESM and ERA-I. Please do address this point in the revised manuscript.

I hope you find this summary helpful. Feel free to contact me if you have any questions. We are looking forward to the revised manuscript.

Best,
Ran

Thank you for taking care of the revision! The manuscript is now accepted.