News Brief by Kip Hansen — 27 May 2023
“NOAA forecasters with the Climate Prediction Center, a division of the National Weather Service, predict near-normal hurricane activity in the Atlantic this year. NOAA’s outlook for the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season, which goes from June 1 to November 30, predicts a 40% chance of a near-normal season, a 30% chance of an above-normal season and a 30% chance of a below-normal season.”
“NOAA is forecasting a range of 12 to 17 total named storms (winds of 39 mph or higher). Of those, 5 to 9 could become hurricanes (winds of 74 mph or higher), including 1 to 4 major hurricanes (category 3, 4 or 5; with winds of 111 mph or higher). NOAA has a 70% confidence in these ranges.”
This list of the 2023 Atlantic tropical cyclone names was selected by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO). The first hurricane of the season will be named Arlene, followed by Brett then Cindy, Don, Emily, Franklin, Gert and so on.
“The upcoming Atlantic hurricane season is expected to be less active than recent years, due to competing factors — some that suppress storm development and some that fuel it — driving this year’s overall forecast for a near-normal season. “ (emphasis mine – kh)
“After three hurricane seasons with La Nina present, NOAA scientists predict a high potential for El Nino to develop this summer, which can suppress Atlantic hurricane activity.” [ source ]
For comparison, the 2022 hurricane season looked like this:
2022 had 14 named storms, 8 hurricanes with 2 major hurricanes and 5 tropical storms. Note that NOAA and the Wiki each have slightly different numbers of tropical storms for the season (5 vs 6). Nonetheless, Hurricane Ian, Cat 5, caused up to 161 human deaths and more than a billion dollars of damage, landfalling in the continental U.S. twice.
As always, those in areas potentially in the path of tropical storms and hurricanes should remain aware of hurricane warnings, be prepared to protect their property from damage, and have plans to evacuate if necessary.
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Author’s Comment:
Having lived in the northern Caribbean on our ancient sailing catamaran for a dozen years, I am well versed in the activities of watching the weather, checking hurricane development daily, and planning, planning and re-planning as conditions changed. Evidence of the success of our plans is that I am here writing this today. We had several close calls and rode out one direct hit in North Carolina near Beaufort.
During hurricane season, I still check the reports and predictions daily; I have family in the USVI, in harm’s way.
Hurricanes are only neat and exciting when they are happening someplace else to someone else. Up close, they are dangerous even for those well prepared.
Be Prepared. Thanks for reading.
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Good review and update. A reminder of the past 3 seasons shows that CO2 is underperforming its global warming expectations.
John ==> The numbers are always interesting, but the hurricanes and storms that matter to most people are the ones that landfall …. hurricanes/tropical storms at sea are of interest to shipping interests and sailors like me.
Fortunately, landfalling hurricanes are decreasing too.
Why did you hypothesize that the number of named storms would increase monotonically with rising CO2 in the first place?
I didn’t say that, but I’m amazed at how well CO2 is controlling our climate. The IPCC is spot off.
I’m responding to the statement “A reminder of the past 3 seasons shows that CO2 is underperforming its global warming expectations.” followed by a table of named storms and major hurricanes for the last 3 years.
Love those reminders. Here’s another … not only are hurricanes decreasing, but so are landfalling hurricanes. The CO2 footprint is quite disappointing … not to mention corals and polar bears are increasing. At least Obama knows how to protect us against sea level rise.
Again…why are you hypothesizing a monotonic increase in named storms and major hurricanes when CO2 increases?
I’m asking because if I understand why you were expecting it I could probably show you evidence that would have falsified your hypothesize without even waiting for the 2020, 2021, and 2022 experiment you preformed above.
A great source of IPCC information.
What does that picture and/or the IPCC have to do with your hypothesis that named storms and major hurricanes will monotonically increase?
It looks pretty good to me so far. And this is for their first prediction more than 30 years ago [IPCC FAR 1990]. I’m curious how well have contrarian predictions done? Easterbrook? Monckton?
Which one predicted the current 7-year trend?
All of them predict cycles like ENSO.
Again, which one predicted this trend? Show me the predicted graph and when it was predicted. It’s only 7 years. Should be easy.
Again…all of them. Scientists have known all along that weather phenomenon contribute to the variability in the global average temperature and that this variability causes extended pauses like these. The hypothesis is that there will be a lot of ups and downs in global average temperature, These ups and downs necessarily mean that there will not only be pauses like the current one, but there will even be transient periods of decline. I recommend going to the KNMI Climate Explorer and downloading all 42 members of the CMIP5 suite so that you can see for yourself what the expectation is from a GCM perspective.
Love your trolling
But you’re still a troll.
No, it’s already the active season in the Atlantic. Circulation in the atmosphere will remain consistent with La Niña.
Likewise in the western Pacific.
http://tropic.ssec.wisc.edu/real-time/mtpw2/product.php?color_type=tpw_nrl_colors&prod=wpac×pan=24hrs&anim=anigf
Sorry.
Ireneusz Palmowski ==> Ah yes, the real world does not go by calendar dates….
NOAA predicts a near-normal 2023 Atlantic hurricane season
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They’re tired of the ridicule for over predicting. How near normal allows them to be right no matter what? Of course if “Normal” is exceeded by any measure, they will say:
“2023 Atlantic hurricane season worse than previously thought.“
How many “near normal” predictions has NOAA made since the year 2000?
I am not sure how it can be normal. El Nino is the bane of surfers on the East coast. The atmospheric response to it blows the tops off the storms. Tropical weather is about the only source for good surf from May to September.
Predictions? How have we/meteorologists done in the past 3 decades? I especially like the “hurricanes will be increasing in size and frequency” from 2006 to 2016 period. I’ll stick to the Farmers’ Almanac.
I am concerned that the UK global warming activists the Met Office have predicted a warm summer given their past forecast failures. The barbecue summer that never stopped raining being one.
Circulation in the South Atlantic promises an active hurricane season.
I’d say this doesn’t mean much. Paraphrasing: 70% confidence that the 30/4/30 prediction is correct. Huh?
Agreed. I’m still scratching my head over that one.
Rud ==> Yes, you have that exactly right 30/40/30—hardly possible to be more middle-of-the-road than that! All-in-all maybe a little less active than 2022. Klotzbach (Bill Gray’s outfit) at CSU says more or less the same thing.
They were only 10% right last year
So this prediction means at worst they will be 30% right.
Science.
But, they are 97% sure of those numbers
So there is that
Predicting a near normal hurricane season? But… but… I see every day in the MSM that we’re having a climate EMERGENCY- sufficient to cause us to spend hundreds of trillions of dollars to fix the problem and save the planet! So, their estimate must be wrong- we’re gonna have many more hurricanes than ever before- or I’m gonna start thinking we should spend that money on other things, like tax breaks so we can spend our own money in any way we like!
My take — 50% chance of normal or below average hurricane season. 50% of normal or above. I predict 100% accuracy in my predictions. But there’s only a 60/40 chance of that.
MSG ==> Almost right — in any case, it is all a guess based on past experience.
And from CSU/Phil Klotzbach ==> “Colorado State University hurricane researchers are predicting a slightly below-average Atlantic hurricane season [.pdf] in 2023, citing the likely development of El Niño as a primary factor.”
“The CSU Tropical Meteorology Project team is predicting 13 named storms during the Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June 1 to November 30. Of those, researchers expect six to become hurricanes and two to reach major hurricane strength (Saffir/Simpson category 3-4-5) with sustained winds of 111 miles per hour or greater.”
After the initial first wave of turtle nests hugged the high tide mark, subsequent nests are now showing up farther from the water.
First two to three months of season light. Storms backloaded on the second half.
Now that is a cool observation. Turtles have had millions of years to evolve survival instincts. The horses we used to have at the farm would grow a hairier winter coat when the winter that followed was worse.
Charles/Rud ==> Well, it’s turtless all the way down — and they know more than we do.
Is there a word to describe extreme underwhelmation – there ought to be if not
Maybe just use ‘NOAA’ itself as the verb:
e.g. OMG, I’ve just been NOAA’d by the news that fish can swim
Good article Kip. The good news. These Atlantic Hurricane forecasts are NOT based on the useless GCM models that predict more or less endless warming if mankind does not change its sinful ways. My impression is that the hurricane forecasts are probably as good as can be done today and are at least marginally better than nothing. Maybe better than that.
Daily tropical weather outlooks are at https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/gtwo.php?basin=atlc&fdays=2 They look pretty good and informative to me. But I’ve never had to depend on them for safety. Might think differently if I had.
The bad news? The resulting “technology” looks to be pretty much the same as that which was used to completely fail to predict California’s extremely wet winter in 2022-2023.
The problem is that hurricanes in the Atlantic depend more on the circulation (stationary high in the north-central) Atlantic than on air temperature. More on the accumulation of warm water in the tropical western Atlantic.
http://tropic.ssec.wisc.edu/real-time/mtpw2/product.php?color_type=tpw_nrl_colors&prod=natl×pan=24hrs&anim=anigf
Don K ==> The two-day forecast is very dependable — prediction out that far is darned good but still if it is landfall data, only accurate to 50 miles or so.
If in the Caribbean, I look to the 7-day forecast here for a longer viewpoint. Start my planning and even re-location of the boat if the forecast makes me feel uncomfortable. 48-hrs is NOT enough if the Captain needs to move the boat 50-100 miles to make a safe harbor or hurricane hole.
In the Hispaniola/Puerto Rico/Virgin Islands region, the Jobos Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve is the best we’ve found, tucking the boat tightly into 20 foot tall mangrove forest with wide deep channels. Alternately, on the north side of Hispaniola is Luperon — but that’s a long way from nowhere—sat out a hurricane there that came over the island, single-handing, with my right arm in a sling.
Actually they are.
“Actually they are”
Could be, I suppose, but I think not. Among other things the step by step integration used in GCM is universally agreed not to work well enough for serious prediction beyond 10-15 days due to error accumulation. BTW-Even 10-15 days is a remarkable achievement. If you ask me, it deserves more credit than it gets.
Conventional forecasting is used during the hurricane season to track and predict current storms. And mostly it works pretty well. But the pre-season seasonal forecasts seem to be basically educated guesses based on preseason distribution of surface water temperatures and similar rather ad hoc indicators. Seems not all that rigorous, but who cares as long as it works at all? Here’s a reference: https://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/Landsea/seasonal/ It’s a few decades old, but as far as I know, the “technology” hasn’t changed all that much.
Got a reference for your claim?
I already posted the reference. It even says which GCMs they use.
Sorry, I didn’t realize that was a link. It does indeed cite the major predictive tools NOAA uses. But if you look into it you will find that those tools are NOT Global Climate Models/General Circulation Models (GCMs). Same acronym and pretty much the same product as far as I can tell. GCMs work by assuming an initial state and how it is changing. They then predict a (very near term) future state, recompute the changes given the new state. Then repeat that over and over. The technology is known as numerical integration. That works very well if you know very precisely how everything changes. Which is to say, it works for satellite orbits, and after a fashion, but not so well for weather. And (my best guess), not at all for climate.
If you read down to paragraph c in your reference you’ll find that the NOAA prediction is the best human judgement of a bunch of factors known or thought to affect Atlantic hurricanes, not the output of numerical integration models. I don’t have any problem with that. An educated guess is probably better than Astrological or Tarot based prediction or whatever.
BTW, Seasonal forecasts in general (weather forecasts months in advance) are all too often wildly inaccurate. But seasonal hurricane forecasts do usually seem to be at least a bit better than that. NOAA, to their credit, does not make improbable claims for the accuracy of their hurricane season predictions.
CFS, HiFLOR-S, SPEAR-MED, NMME, GloSea6, and Seas5 are all GCMs or ensembles of GCMs. Other GCMs not listed here are also involved including those in the IRI dynamic ENSO guidance suite.
Meanwhile, in the western Pacific, we have a circulation typical of La Niña. The typhoon threatens the northern Philippines and Taiwan.
Ireneusz Palmowsk ==> Gotta love the satellite images and videos…
https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/sat/satlooper.php?region=himawari9-meso&product=ir
Anyone used these images to measure wind speeds?
G’Day It doesn’t add up,
“…measure wind speeds?”
Duck Duck Go “earth null school map”. When the globe comes up, click on the word “Earth”. Select ‘Air’, ‘Wind’, ‘Sfc’ (surface). Enlarge the image, rotate the globe, zoom in. Try the various ‘Overlay’ items. MSLP in the storm center will give a idea of just how serious the storm is. ‘Click’ the green circle where you wish to get a reading. Have fun…..
But is that how they measure the wind speeds? I think not.
G’Day again, It doesnot add up
“But is that how they measure the wind speeds.”
Not sure who the ‘they’ would be. Governments might send aircraft into the storm to take measurements. There might be one or more ships in that area with instruments.
Just how ‘earth’ comes up with their wind-speed figures I don’t know. At the local level, from experience over the past four+ years, they do a reasonable job. (Their temperatures often lag local readings by up to 20 minutes, take them with a ‘grain of salt’)
My point was that the time lapse photos allow wind speeds to be estimated by comparing features in successive images and seeing how far they have moved in a defined interval of time. It would be interesting to compare such estimates against other methods.
G’Day again, It doesnot add up,
“…comparing features in successive images…”
Serious doubts as to obtaining any sort of useful data from this approach. Looking at the tops of ever changing clouds at high altitude wouldn’t tell much about wind speed at sea level, or any other height.
“…how far they have moved…”
Would need a scale to determine the distance moved. For aerial photography this is normally established by two (or more) identifiable ground features a known distance apart. For satellite photos of storms – highly unlikely, not enough detail.
Here is a link with the typhoon marked:
https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/surface/level/orthographic=-244.51,12.29,264/loc=126.825,19.030
Most likely to recurve and weaken and not hit any major landmass as a typhoon.
Uh-oh. I’d definitely have the plywood handy if I lived in hurricane alley. Probably going to be a wild one.
Given NOAA’s track record of hurricane season predictions, they would do better to just stop predicting hurricanes. Based on NOAA’s prediction, I’d make a wager that this hurricane season will be well above or well below normal.
I’m predicting the accuracy of the 2023 Atlanlic hurricane prediction will be “near-normal”. i.e. as accurate as random number generator.
Last year they were 1/10th
So 2022, a La Niña year, was supposed to be above average, and wasn’t. Now in an El Niño year it is supposed to be normal. But El Niño years are supposed to suppress hurricanes somewhat. But I do like the fudge factors in the forecasted numbers.
I’m going with 33-1/3 across the board, covering my bets
Undoubtedly that’s what they wanted to say but it would look a little to slick Willy.
I suppose it was beyond their cultural place in the science of futurology to simply say.
“We have looked at the normal indicators and don’t expect anything other than a normal season of weather”
I guess with CO2 at an all time modern history high, around 418 PPM the alarmists are not allowed to say situation stable no story here.
NB Here in central UK the weather has been particularly pleasant this past week with no rain and constant sunshine though temperatures continue to be low. We have topped out at around 21 deg. C which is perfect. Sadly my bees also think the weather is ideal to do a fly away and swarmed off yesterday. You win some and you lose some that’s life.
Similar here in western canada, nicest May in a while
So of course everyone swarmed out into the bush and started a bunch of fires (most accidental but some arson arrests, there is an election the climate/insane need to win after all)
So unfortunately Alberta will get a record year for fires and acreage burnt unless it rains a lot more.
Of course, 95% human started, without that we’d be fine.
Soon the first tropical storm may form in the Caribbean Sea.
We see high in the southeastern tropical Pacific, which will favor convection in the Caribbean Sea.
http://tropic.ssec.wisc.edu/real-time/mtpw2/product.php?color_type=tpw_nrl_colors&prod=samer1×pan=24hrs&anim=anigf
I see where the sea temperatures in a few places are at 30C. So when the temperatures exceed 30C, the hurricane forms?
No, wind is also needed to concentrate water vapor. Surface temperatures above 30 degrees immediately cause high convection, since the surface temperature of the open ocean does not exceed 31 C.
Strong spikes in galactic radiation since the beginning of 2023 show an unusually abrupt course of the 25th solar cycle. This brings anomalies in the circulation of the jet stream.
Based on the concept of almost always wrong, predict an above average year, sorry in advance to all those in SE USA.
A strong cyclone in the southeast Pacific heading toward Antarctica will push cold surface waters from the south toward the tropics.
Joe Bastardi was making these same points several weeks ago. The thing is as we get to the beginning of the Atlantic season El Nino conditions have not really kicked in yet and so neither has a potential for powerful sheer.
It is looking to me that the most likely scenario this year is for a very active early season in the Atlantic with good potential for landfalls on the US and then a lessoning threat as the El Nino strengthens later in the season.
But what does an old retired truck driver know?