by WASHINGTON (AP) – Get ready for what almost all experts predict will be one of the busiest Atlantic hurricane seasons on record, thanks to unprecedented ocean heat and the brewing La Nina.
There is an 85% chance that the Atlantic hurricane season that begins in June will be above average in storm activity, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration announced Thursday in its annual outlook. The weather agency predicted between 17 and 25 named storms brew up this summer and fall, with 8 to 13 reaching hurricane status (continuous winds of at least 75 mph) and 4-7 of them being major hurricanes, with at least 111 wind mph.
The Atlantic hurricane season produces 14 named storms, seven of which are hurricanes and three are major hurricanes.
“This season is shaping up to be an unusual season in a number of ways,” said NOAA Administrator Rick Spinrad. He said this forecast is the busiest in the 25 years NOAA has been issuing in May. The agency updates its forecasts every August.
About 20 other groups — universities, other governments, private weather companies — also produce seasonal forecasts. All but two expect a busier, milder summer and fall for hurricanes. The average of those other forecasts is about 11 hurricanes, or about 50% more than in a normal year.
“All the ingredients are certainly in place to have an active season,” said National Weather Service Director Ken Graham. “It’s a cause for concern, of course, but not panic.”
What people should be most concerned about is water because 90% of hurricane deaths are in water and are preventable, Graham said.
When meteorologists look at how busy hurricane season is, two factors matter: the temperature of the ocean in the Atlantic where storms form and need warm water for fuel, and whether it’s La Nina or El Nino, the cooling or the natural and periodic heating. of the waters of the Pacific Ocean that change weather patterns around the world. A La Nina tends to accelerate Atlantic storm activity while Pacific storminess and El Nino do the opposite.
La Nina usually reduces high-altitude winds that can decapitate hurricanes, and generally during La Nina there is more instability or storms in the atmosphere, which can seed hurricane development. Storms get their energy from warm water. Ocean waters have been warmer for 13 months in a row and La Nina is expected to emerge by mid to late summer. The current El Nino is waning and is expected to be gone within a month or so.
“We’ve never had a La Nina with ocean temperatures this warm in recorded history so it’s a little bit ominous,” said Brian McNoldy, a University of Miami tropical meteorology researcher.
This May, ocean heat in the main area where hurricanes develop was as high as it usually is in mid-August. “That’s crazy,” McNoldy said. Both records are warm at the ocean surface and at depth, which is “a little scary.”
He said he wouldn’t be surprised to see storms earlier than normal this year as a result. Peak hurricane seasons are usually between mid-August and mid-October with the official season starting on June 1st and ending on November 30th.
A year ago, the two factors were against each other. Instead of La Nina, El Nino was strong, which inhibits storminess a bit. Experts at the time said they weren’t sure which of those factors would win out.
Hot water wins. There were 20 named storms last year, the fourth highest since 1950 and well above the average of 14. The overall measure of strength, duration and frequency of storms last season was 17% above normal.
Record warm water appears to be critical, McNoldy said.
“Things went off the rails last spring (2023) and haven’t gotten back on the rails since,” McNoldy said.
“Hurricanes live off warm ocean water,” said Colorado State University hurricane researcher Phil Klotzbach. “That’s usually fuel for the hurricane. But also when you have a warm Atlantic, what that tends to do is push more air up over the Atlantic, higher movement, which helps foster strong thunderstorms.”
The warmest ocean on record is bad news, not only because of hurricanes but also because it harms shipping, important ocean currents, coral reefs and fisheries, Spinrad said.
The background to human-caused climate change is generally warmer water, but this is not much warmer, McNoldy said. He said other contributors could include the eruption of an undersea volcano in the South Pacific in 2022, sending millions of tonnes of water vapor into the air to trap heat, and a reduction in sulfur in ship fuels. The latter meant fewer particles in the air that reflect sunlight and cool the atmosphere slightly.
Seven of the last 10 Atlantic hurricane seasons were more active than the long-term average.
Climate change in general is making the strongest hurricanes more intense, bringing more rain to storms and putting more pressure on them, McNoldy said.
Graham, former director of the National Hurricane Center, said that because the oceans are getting warmer, storms are coming faster, people need to be prepared early for everything. All the worst Category 5 hurricanes with winds over 156 miles per hour that hit the United States were not even strong enough to become a hurricane three days before landfall.
Klotzbach and his team at Colorado State University – who pioneered hurricane season forecasting – gave a 62% probability that the United States will be hit by a major hurricane with winds of at least 111 mph. The chance is usually 43%. The Caribbean has a two-in-three chance of being hit by a major hurricane and the US Gulf Coast has a 42% chance of being smacked by such a storm, the CSU forecast said. For the US East Coast the chance of a major hurricane hit is 34%.
Klotzbach said he doesn’t see how anything could change soon enough to prevent a busy season this year.
“The die has been cast a little bit,” Klotzbach said.
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