OAN’s Taylor Tinsley
3:07 PM – Thursday, August 10, 2023
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecasted more storms for the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season.
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On Thursday, NOAA forecasters said this year’s hurricane season has increased from near-normal level activity to a 60% chance of an above-normal season, a 30% increase from the previous outlook in May.
The six-month hurricane season ends on November 30th and the administration’s outlook, which ranges with a 70% confidence rate, predicted 14-21 named storms, 6-11 of which could become hurricanes, and 2-5 could develop into major hurricanes with winds of up to 111 mph or greater.
“Our six to 11 hurricanes that are now forecast this year, which we had five to nine forecast earlier, would be in line with the eight hurricanes we had last year and the seven hurricanes from the year before that,” said NOAA forecaster Matthew Rosencrans. “Normal for each one of these categories is 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes.”
Forecasters predict there’s a 95% chance that ongoing El Nino conditions, which is a periodic warming of surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean, will continue through the Northern Hemisphere winter.
NOAA noted El Nino usually “results in atmospheric conditions that help lessen tropical activity during the Atlantic season,” but those conditions have been slow to develop.
“One of the biggest changes that we saw was the forecast wind shear over the Atlantic is forecast by many of the models to be lower than it was, which lower wind shear is conducive to more tropical cyclone or tropical storm formation,” Rosecrans said. “So now most of the models are forecasting either near or below average wind shear when in May some of the models had forecast the above average wind shear.”
NOAA hurricane outlooks are forecasts for the overall 2023 season, not landfalls.
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