Treasure Coast-March 31, 2022: The forecast for the 2022 Atlantic Hurricane Season looks much like last season, 16 to 20 named tropical storms are what the meteorologists at AccuWeather predict this year. Nearly as many as last year according to AccuWeather’s Senior Meteorologist Dan Kottlowski.
"Unfortunately, another active season this year," said Kottlowski. "Of those named storms we believe 6 to 8 will become hurricanes. Of those hurricanes we expect 3 to 5 of those hurricanes to be major hurricanes.”
About four to six direct impacts are predicted for 2022.
The forecast is not as bad as 2020 which set a record of 31 named storms, but it's a lot like last year. In 2021 we had 21 named storms, the third most active season on record. Of those 21 storms, 7 were hurricanes and four were major hurricanes. Eight of the storms made a direct impact on the U.S.
The official start of the hurricane season is on June 1st which is still two months away, but once again the forecast calls for a chance of a pre-season storm developing. “The last 7 years we’ve had pre-season development," said Kottlowski, "and conditions have been very favorable for pre-season development for one reason and that is very warm water.”
“Bottom line, this year we have La Nina," said Kottlowski, "which means less (wind)shear, and very warm water which brings us more energy to those storms. That’s why this season will be another active season.”
