Meteorologists predicted a busy Atlantic hurricane season—and a recent lull in activity doesn’t negate that
. But as the typical peak of the season arrives in early September, the basin has been eerily quiet. The most recent named storm, Ernesto, dissipated around August 21. So were the direExperts say that despite the current lull, this season has already been strong—and could still become even more active. So far this year the Atlantic has seen five named storms: two tropical storms, two hurricanes and one major hurricane. Theearlier than any previous storm in the Atlantic.
Moreover the Atlantic hurricane season stretches until November 30—leaving plenty of time for activity to ramp up again and erase the calm of recent weeks. “Just because we’re kind of stumped about the last couple weeks and maybe this week, it’s definitely too early to say anything about the whole hurricane season,” McNoldy says.
Dense bands of Saharan dust streamed offshore from southern Morocco over the Atlantic Ocean on August 24, 2024. A second factor of interest is that the West African monsoon has been unusually wet this year, says Kelly Núñez Ocasio, an atmospheric scientist at Texas A&M University. The West African monsoon is a seasonal wind pattern that carries rain from the Atlantic Ocean over into West Africa between June and September. Núñez Ocasio has studied how the monsoon affects the seeds of hurricanes.
Núñez Ocasio would like forecasters to start looking beyond the Atlantic Ocean to assess hurricane-forming conditions. But for the general public, she adds that it’s still important for people in the Caribbean and the southern and eastern U.S. to stay on their guard because even unnamed storm systems can cause serious flooding and other damage.
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