Much of predicting the future involves looking to the past for clues about what we can expect in the weeks and months ahead. History provides us plenty of clues as to what we can expect in the months ahead as the eastern Pacific Ocean continues its streak of abnormal warmth.
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But, as we’ve seen before, this year will play out on its own terms with its own quirks. It’s not just the Pacific Ocean that’s unusually warm right now—oceans around the world are facing unprecedented warmth this year, which is a major wild card for this upcoming season.
After all, most El Niño years see below-average hurricane activity in the Atlantic. An average year would see 14 named storms, and some El Niño seasons have only produced half as many storms.
This year, however, we’ve seen 19 named storms in the Atlantic, including three major hurricanes in Franklin, Idalia, and Lee—the latter of which became just the 29th scale-topping Category 5 storm in the Atlantic since the satellite era began in 1960.
Header image courtesy of NOAA.
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