Image Credit: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) – National Climatic Data Center (NCDC)
By WUWT Regular Just The Facts
From the Insurance Journal:
“The 2013 Atlantic hurricane season looks set to go down as a big washout, marking the first time in 45 years that the strongest storm to form was just a minor Category 1 hurricane.
There could still be a late surprise in the June 1-Nov. 30 season, since the cyclone that mushroomed into Superstorm Sandy was just revving up at this time last year.
But so far, at least, it has been one of the weakest seasons since modern record-keeping began about half a century ago, U.S. weather experts say. Apart from Tropical Storm Andrea, which soaked Florida after moving ashore in the Panhandle in June, none of this year’s cyclones has made a U.S. landfall.”
“It has been “a very strange sort of year” in the unpredictable world of cyclones, said Jeff Masters, a hurricane expert and director of meteorology at Weather Underground. “We’ve been in this multi-decadal pattern of activity but it just didn’t happen this year,” Masters said, referring to the prolonged period of increased hurricane activity that began in 1995.”
“There were two short-lived Category 1 hurricanes this year, making it the first Atlantic season since 1968 when no storm made it beyond the first level of intensity, according to the National Hurricane Center.
It has also been a year marked by the fewest number of hurricanes since 1982 and the first since 1994 without the formation of a major hurricane.
In terms of so-called “Accumulated Cyclone Energy” (ACE), a common measure of the total destructive power of a season’s storms, 2013 ranks among the 10 weakest since the dawn of the satellite era in the mid-1960s, said Dennis Feltgen, a spokesman for the Miami-based National Hurricane Center. “The ACE so far in 2013 is 33 percent of normal,” he said.”
“Phil Klotzbach, a Colorado State University climatologist, readily admits that the forecasts are based on statistical models that will “occasionally fail,” since the atmosphere is chaotic and subject to fluctuations that cannot be predicted more than a week or two in advance.”
For reference here are Global Tropical Cyclone Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) – 1971 to Present;
Global Tropical Cyclone Frequency- 1971 to Present;
Global Hurricane Frequency – 1978 to Present;
US Hurricanes 1851 – 2010;
and Australian Region Tropical Cyclones 1970–2011 (Severe tropical cyclones are those which show a minimum central pressure less than 970 hPa);
So I guess that we don’t need to buckle up for those Category 6 hurricanes after all?:
If you look at superstorm Sandy on October 29th, the ocean water east of New Jersey was nine degrees fahrenheit above average. That’s what put so much more energy into that storm. That’s what put so much more water vapor into that storm. Would there be a storm anyway? Maybe so. Would there be hurricanes and floods and droughts without man-made global warming? Of course. But they’re stronger now. The extreme events are more extreme. The hurricane scale used to be 1-5 and now they’re adding a 6. The fingerprint of man-made global warming is all over these storms and extreme weather events. Al Gore – Washington Post
To see more information on Sea Ice please visit the WUWT Tropical Cyclone Page and WUWT “Extreme Weather” Page.
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2010 and 2011 look to be even quieter, judging from Figure 1: http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/images/cei/step6.02-01.gif
A prediction for 2014.
Hurricanes will number between, very roughly, -3.762 and 117.508. More-or-less, about. Note that no responsibility whatsoever is taken for those relying on the precision – or even the order – of these close climate estimates.
No children or animals were harmed in the production of these scientifically precise numbers, from random.org, with added kitten-power from Twizzle [who’s spoilt!].
Sorry – /sarc.
Did you guess?
We cannot guess the next solar cycle. We cannot guess the hurricane count six months in advance. We cannot guess el Niño or la Nina a year in advance. We cannot guess Arctic sea ice extent. We don’t even try to guess cloud cover. Regardless we know with 95% certainty what is going on with CAGW for the next century.
And Al Gore had a meeting with insurance companies to raise everyone’s rates due to global warming causing more hurricanes. When will Gore face jail time?
This trend should continue into 2025. Then, if my hypothesis is correct, a season with out tropical storms should occur.
My paper. http://sunspotshurricanesandglaciers.com/image/62226346.png
We are in Solar minimum. Hurricanes should drop off and glacier and Polar Ice Caps should pick up. There should be longer winters and winters without summers.
We may have seen the start of the cooler climate with the lost of more than 20,000 head of cattle in the winter storm that hit South Dakota 4 weekends ago.
This already showed up in smaller countries over the last couple of winters with lost of elderly in the United Kingdom and lambs in Scotland and New Zealand.
The drought worldwide is the result of the lack of sunspot activity
Sincerely,
Paul Pierett
Using Al Gore’s counting methodology – see previous post – the US has experienced 127 hurricanes so far this year with a firm prediction for another 17 over the next six weeks.
You see, this is just more proof that the climate is changing and we’ve got to stop it.
Extreme hurricanes are just a thing of the past? Children won’t have a clue what these things were. :-)It won’t be long before a paper comes out blaming man’s eeeeevil Satanic gases for this awful state of affairs.
The models predicted it!
On the Extreme Weather page, what’s with the Tornadoes’ US Departure from Normal Annual Running Total 2011 vs 2012 — yoo hoo, it’s 2013 now.
What a tragedy for the catastrophists!
looking at your 3rd graph you can see that up until about 98 hurricanes were up , globally, whereas from that time they were down, similarly to temperatures going up until 2000 and global temps. down from 2002. You can see what’s happening?
Just like I told you.
In 7 years time there will be disaster.
No winds…no rain…just droughts up north.
http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/04/29/the-climate-is-changing/
Excuse me,
Lets stay with the current data as compared to past data and not get mired into fanciful futures.
A fact is a fact and this past season is still weather.
lsvalgaard says: October 26, 2013 at 10:19 am
2010 and 2011 look to be even quieter, judging from Figure 1: http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/images/cei/step6.02-01.gif
The “US Extremes in Landfalling Tropical Systems – 1910 to Present – Annual” isn’t a pure count, it is based on:
They note that:
In further detail:
For reference, the “first five indicators” are as follows:
Also, the Extremes in Landfalling Tropical Systems graph shows the Most Recent 12-Month Period (Feb-Jan), thus it is not to present. I would expect that it would return to zero like 2010 and 2011, once it is updated in Feb 2014.
On the two-tailed Gaussian distribution this lack of hurricane activity falls into the extreme low end of occurrences. Thus, it is representative of extreme weather and fully supports climate change and global warming. Should next years hurricane activity be completely average, it could be judged representative of extreme average weather and fully support climate change and global warming. But then, what doesn’t support global warming?
lsvalgaard says:
October 26, 2013 at 10:19 am
2010 and 2011 look to be even quieter, judging from Figure 1: http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/images/cei/step6.02-01.gif
—————————
“Atlantic” and “US” are different things.
I almost wish we did have a major hurricane this year. We know The Weather Channel has “gone green” but to keep recycling Sandy……..it must be getting boring even for them.
Obviously, the heat that used to go into hurricane formation is now being sucked into the deep oceans. Scary thought for Halloween, no? How many thought of Ross Perot?
Most hurricane scales go up to five, but Algore’s goes up to six (with apologies to Spinal Tap fans).
Big storm due this weekend the other side of the pond. 80 mph winds.
Worst in 26 years.
No guesses as to headlines.
Good golly, did ya have to quote Masters! He is one of the biggest alarmists out there. When the weather channel bought his Web site their alarmism stepped up 2 fold. BTW, he is an air pollution meteorologist. WUWT?
This eerie calm is unprecedented. The eeriness and lack of precedence are worse than we thought. Mutilple independent studies confirm the adverse effects of eeriness when unprecedented…
Oh, for chrissake! I can’t keep this tripe up for much longer. Just give me my bloody Nobel!
Well researched, as usual, JTF.
Thanks!
But but but more frequent weather extremes are consistent with global warming…err, climate change…theory.
Now there are even more hurricanes “in the pipeline.”
Is the windy stuff hiding somewhere?