Hurricane season will reach its approximate peak on Friday — but this year, not a single hurricane has yet formed in the Atlantic Ocean, setting a new record for a lack of storms.
This is the latest into the Atlantic season without a hurricane forming since weather satellites were first launched in the 1960s.
In 2002, Hurricane Gustav formed on Sept. 11. And Humberto became a hurricane on Sept. 11, 2013.
This September, no hurricanes are on the horizon. The National Hurricane Center noted, as of Friday, that no tropical cyclone activity is expected within the next week. The ocean basin is virtually silent. That means the newly set record will probably be pushed by at least another week or so, if not more.
The Pacific Ocean, meanwhile, has been hyperactive with storms.
Just last week, three hurricanes roamed the eastern and central Pacific simultaneously. One of them was a Lowell, a Category 5 that weakened and then sideswiped Kauai, Hawaii, bringing significant impacts and closing the airport.
At one point, Lowell was a Category 5 and Karina was a Category 4. That’s the first time two high-end hurricanes have been observed in the Pacific at the same time.
So what’s with the meteorological seesaw? Blame El Niño.
Right now, we’re approaching the peak of a record-strong El Niño.
El Niño begins with a warming of water temperatures in the eastern tropical Pacific. When sea surface temperatures reach at least 0.9 degrees Fahrenheit above the long-term mean and remain at that elevated level for several months, the weather pattern is considered an El Niño. In the key El Niño monitoring region, sea surface temperatures are approaching their highest values ever recorded. And those waters are forecast to continue to warm through the end of the year.
And they could climb even higher, approaching 4.5 degrees above average this winter.
That blob of warm ocean waters heats the air above, causing that air to rise. Rising air generates more storms, which is why the Pacific is having so many hurricanes.
But what goes up must come down. Air sinks in the Atlantic, squashing attempts at tropical development. Plus, harsher high-altitude winds, also corresponding with El Niño, are tearing apart fledgling tropical waves before they can organize.
That’s why the Atlantic is running nearly 90 percent below average in terms of ACE, or accumulated cyclone energy, which describes how much energy tropical cyclones extract from the ocean and expend as strong winds.
That’s the lowest amount on record, considering data since 1950.
It remains to be seen how long the dearth of activity continues. There are some indications that the western Caribbean may perk up around the week of Sept. 20, with developing conditions more conducive to storm formation.
Still, it’s important to remember that even quiet seasons can be disastrous.
In 1992, for instance — considered a quiet season — only seven named storms formed, and just one of them was a major hurricane. Except that one hurricane was Andrew. It lay siege to Homestead, a town just south of Miami that was shredded by winds in the 160- to 180-mph range.
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