Florida - Thursday August 25, 2022: Its been a quiet hurricane season to date, but don’t let that fool you. The National Hurricane Center issued an update Thursday advising residents to be on their guard, the busiest part of the season is yet to come.
NOAA’s initial forecast for the hurricane season released on May 24 called for 14 to 21 named storms with 3 to 6 major hurricanes. Early this month they revised that forecast downward by one … no more than 20 names storms and no more than 5 major hurricanes. But so far, there’s only been 3 named storms, Alex, Bonnie and Collin, early in the season.
The Acting Director of the National Hurricane Center Jamie Rhome says the center has been getting a number of questions about what seems like a slow start to the 2022 Hurricane Season.
“There has not been a lot of activity over the last month or so. Note the over-all lack of activity in the part of the basin that typically will spin up in August and ramp up to a peak in September," said Rhome, "But thus far we're tracing little activity down here.”
However, Rhome says, history tells a cautionary tale. He cites 4 hurricane seasons in the past that have had as much hurricane activity, or less, than our current season.
Those were the 1967 … the 1977 … 1984 … and 1988.
“Now what’s really interesting about all of those seasons, even though they started slow," said Rhome, "they all produced a hurricane impact, or storm impact, in the United States during the month of September.”
There is a lot of hurricane season in front of us said Rhome and we have to remain focused and prepared. “I know it’s hard to stay focused and prepared, but unfortunately it’s not until the fall that we can lower our guard.”