In 2018, a modest El Niño gradually developed by late September and shut down tropical activity in the Gulf and Caribbean in mid-October… right after a monster Category 5 hurricane slammed the Panhandle. But it only takes oneĮven if El Niño develops, that isn’t a be-all and end-all for U.S. In April 2017, several of these models called for a super El Niño by summer in reality, a weak La Niña developed in the fall, and the Atlantic hurricane season was one of the most active on record. However, the dynamical guidance has had a pro-Niño bias in other recent springs. That is all well and good, as the stronger and earlier the Niño, the greater the historical probability of a quieter Atlantic hurricane season. Most “dynamical” models initiate El Niño by August or September. Many sophisticated computer models that simulate the ocean-atmosphere system are going wild, calling for a much faster emergence of strong El Niño conditions by summer. The official El Niño/La Niña forecast from the National Weather Service has about a 60% chance of El Niño arriving by the peak of hurricane season in September.

In the past month, temperatures in the Central Pacific have returned to near-normal after three years of cool anomalies, while the waters of the Eastern Pacific have surged warmer, which sometimes presages El Niño development. In 2023, the ENSO outlook is a riddle wrapped in an enigma, like the bizarre names found on the backs of the original XFL uniforms, including those of the Orlando Rage. Unfortunately, spring projections face a “predictability barrier” of diminished forecast skill due to the susceptibility of the Pacific to sudden shifts. Roughly doubled hurricane risks in La Niña versus El Niño seasons, with neutral years somewhere in the middle, holds true for U.S. In Florida, La Niña seasons since 1900 have notched an average of 0.8 hurricane landfalls per year, compared with around 0.4 hurricane landfalls per year during El Niños. The disparity is even more stark in terms of what really matters, stronger storms impacting land. As summer and fall El Niños are often linked to hurricane-weakening wind shear in the Atlantic, La Niña hurricane seasons average about 75% more tropical activity than El Niño years. The reason for this cautious optimism is that Atlantic hurricane activity has a strong relationship with the multi-year cycle of abnormally warm (El Niño) or cool (La Niña) waters in the Equatorial Pacific known as the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO). The ’23 season has a 50-50 shot of landing somewhere between 65-135 ACE units, 13-18 tropical storms, 5-8 hurricanes, and 2-3 major hurricanes. This corresponds to odds of a below normal (125 ACE) season at about 30%. WeatherTiger’s initial forecast for the 2023 Atlantic season holds out around a 70% chance of normal or below normal tropical activity in the year ahead, projecting a most likely outcome of around 90% to 95% of 1950-2022 averages.

What are the odds of a normal hurricane season? Scars still raw: Here's how Fort Myers Beach, Southwest Florida are recovering 6 months after Hurricane IanĪnd yet, with the demise of La Niña this March, an unfamiliar feeling hides in the corner of the Pandora’s Box that is hurricane season: hope. Upgrade: Ian winds topped 161 mph before landfall, costliest hurricane in state history View Gallery: Aerial views of Fort Myers Beach six months after Hurricane IanĪfter Ian: National Hurricane Center used to give 2-day outlooks. In each of the 2020, 2021, and 2022 seasons, the Gulf Coast suffered a catastrophic Category 4 hurricane landfall, culminating with Ian’s $113 billion lapidation of Southwest Florida. since the 1930s, with a total of 25 (!) tropical storm, eleven hurricane, and four major hurricane strikes. In the Tropics, La Niña also fomented the busiest three-year period for the continental U.S. Like the world’s worst gender reveal, the 2020-23 La Niña’s résumé included staggering drought in the Plains and Florida’s “winters” lasting around 4 days.

Since then, as everything else has changed other than the 99-cent price of AriZona iced tea, global weather patterns have consistently been in the thrall of the third-longest Niña on record. La Niña, defined by colder than normal sea surface temperatures (SSTs) in the Central Pacific, developed in the summer of 2020. Watch Video: A look back at Hurricane Ian’s trail of destruction 6 months laterĪ little more than three years ago, as sports bar TVs were split between coronavirus infection tallies and the XFL, a more subtle but no less x-treme scourge was taking shape across the tropical oceans.

Hurricane meteorologist