“Near-normal” in this case actually means there might be more activity than there has been over the past three years, which NOAA describes as “below normal”. Hurricane Joaquin, one of two storms to reach major hurricane strength, killed all 33 mariners aboard a cargo ship that sank off the Bahamas in October.
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The hurricane season runs from June 1st through November 30th.
The federal agency acknowledged some overall uncertainty in the forecast, and said its predictions were made with 70 percent likelihood.
But the climate factors that contribute to hurricane formation are still unsettled, making it harder to predict. “This is a more challenging hurricane season outlook than most because it’s difficult to determine whether there will be reinforcing or competing climate influences on tropical storm development”, said Gerry Bell, lead seasonal hurricane forecaster at NOAA.
Meanwhile, the USA government is set to release its forecast for how many hurricanes and tropical storms are expected to form over Atlantic and Caribbean waters in the next six months.
A summer that produced 16 named storms would be well above the dozen storms that form during an average season and would be considered an active summer. Alex, an unusual January hurricane that spun out at sea, was the first storm of 2016.
“Storms are getting more organized over the Bahamas on Friday morning as the weather system meanders over the warm waters of the Atlantic”, News 6 meteorologist Candace Campos said.
“Everybody along the southeast coast from Georgia through the Carolinas should watch the progress of this system very closely, and whether in fact maybe you should modify your weekend plans to take into account the prospect of severe weather along the eastern coast”, warns NOAA Administrator Dr. Kathryn Sullivan.
The forecast does not predict the systems’ tracks or whether they will make landfall. Six to 11 of those could become hurricanes, including three to six major hurricanes.
But even a low-activity season can bring catastrophic storms. It has a high chance of becoming a tropical or subtropical cyclone.
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“If this shift proves to be more than short-lived, it could usher in a low-activity era for Atlantic hurricanes, and this period may already have begun”.
