Just before the start of every Atlantic Hurricane Season, various organizations put out forecasts for how busy they believe the season will be.
A myriad of tactics are used including looking at global circulation patterns and teleconnections (i.e. El Niño/La Niña, Madden Julian Oscillation), sea surface temperatures and how they compare to average, among many other things. While it may appear that the behavior of all these factors will go a particular way, things don’t always go according to plan.
Take the 2022 Atlantic Hurricane Season, for example. Being in a La Niña pattern, which tends to increase Atlantic tropical activity, NOAA forecast that the season would be above average. The season ended up being near the definition of an average season: 14 named storms, 8 hurricanes, 2 of which became Category 3 or stronger. An average season is 14, 7, and 3, respectively.
On top of that, we witnessed history as a giant Saharan Dust outbreak caused a pause in tropical development for 60 days! From July 3rd through the end of August, not one tropical system formed! This was the second longest formation pause in the tropical Atlantic in history!
Flip-flop to this year’s season: We’re ahead of schedule! We are 4 named storms in, with one of those storms, Don, making a brief stint up to hurricane status. We don’t typically see our 4th named storm or first hurricane until mid-August.
We are well ahead of schedule while in the middle of an El Niño pattern, one that tends to deter tropical formation.
Currently, a tropical wave a few hundred miles southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands has the potential to be the Atlantic basin’s next depression or named storm this weekend or early next week.
The National Hurricane Center is giving this wave a 60% chance of development as it tracks to the west-northwest. This would be the 5th named storm of the season, named Emily, which we typically wouldn’t see form until the end of August.
Elsewhere, an area of disorganized showers and thunderstorms just off the coast of Nicaragua has a low 10% chance of development as it continues to push onshore. It will be nothing but a rain-maker for Central America.
Hurricane seasons are like children, sometimes they act accordingly. Other times, they behave differently from what you had in mind.