Early Look At 2022 Hurricane Season: Another Bad One?

Hurricane Ida approaching the Gulf Coast last year. 2021
was a busy and destructive hurricane year, and forecasters
feared this year could be just as bad.

 Severe thunderstorm and tornado season is just going into it prime time right now.

It looks like there will be another nasty outbreak of twisters much of this week  in the middle of the nation.

While that's the most immediate threat, other meteorologists are looking ahead toward the late summer and fall. Those meteorologists do not like what they see.  

We could be in for another rough hurricane season. 

The past six hurricane seasons have all been busy and awful, and it would be nice if we caught a break this year. 

At least one team of hurricane experts are saying, "No such luck."

The scientists from Colorado State University, led by research Philip Klotzbach, just released their annual hurricane prediction, and it ain't pretty. 

Their report calls for 19 named Atlantic storms this year, against an average of 14.4. They predict nine hurricanes, compared to an average of 7.2  The researchers also predict four major hurricanes, with winds of at least 111 mph.  The average number of major hurricanes yearly is 3.2.

This prediction covers all of the Atlantic basin, and says nothing about how many, if any, end up making landfall in the United States. However, the greater the number of tropical storms the greater than chance that at least one, or a few, make their way to American shores.  

On top of that, the Colorado State hurricane researchers say some meteorological factors will help increase the chances of United States landfall. They put the chances of major hurricane hitting somewhere in the United States at 71 percent. 

As the Washington Post reports, the major reason for the grim hurricane prediction is a lack of an El Nino. 

Instead, we're in the opposite La Nina pattern which reduces wind shear over the tropical Atlantic.  Wind shear is a change in wind direction and speed with height. Wind shear can rip apart wannabe tropical storms, so a lack of that shear can help encourage hurricanes to form.  

Even if La Nina weakens over the course of the next several months, we almost certainly won't flip into El Nino during hurricane season, so the chances of a lot of such storms would remain strong.

Another factor that could increase hurricane danger in the United States this year is water temperatures. Those temperatures are already above normal in the Gulf of Mexico and off most of the East Coast. Warmer water is more efficient at nurturing hurricanes. If water temperatures are above normal, then that much more energy could go in to budding tropical storms to make them worse than they otherwise would be. 

The Colorado 'State hurricane forecast is rather grim, but the science isn't perfect yet at all on long range hurricane predictions. There's always the possibility that some unknown factor could come up between now and late summer that would either help reduce hurricanes or make the season even wilder. 

The hurricane prediction also can't tell us where any particular hurricane would hit the United States or when.  We wouldn't know that until a few days before the storm actually appears and approaches the coast.