Is this just a very slow start to the season, or is the season actually going to significantly underperform?

[toad strangler]

How will we know until late October? We could have a record September but an early halt to the season will still leave us well below normal. Labor day is the 5th this year, and if we have no storms and nothing on the models then in my opinion something is wrong. The Tonga theory is interesting, it's never happened before (that much water vapor) but it will take years, or might be impossible, to say for sure that was it.

Because everything now. And first. That’s not a hit on aspen for starting the thread. Since people post question threads like how many, where, when, etc. i wonder if I should pose the question - how ruined is your life with a slow starting hurricane season.

Cyclonic Fury started this thread.

And I’ll be smitten if this continues all season

[Astromanía]

September 15th it's the final day I will give the ATL to be active before I say "season cancel"

[Hammy]

September 15th it's the final day I will give the ATL to be active before I say "season cancel"

Don't do that, now nothing will form until September 16 but then we'll have like 15 storms in six weeks

[hurricanehunter69]

The season already has underperformed in my opinion. Big question now is whether or not the season finishes average or below average...?

[Teban54]

How will we know until late October? We could have a record September but an early halt to the season will still leave us well below normal. Labor day is the 5th this year, and if we have no storms and nothing on the models then in my opinion something is wrong. The Tonga theory is interesting, it's never happened before (that much water vapor) but it will take years, or might be impossible, to say for sure that was it.

Random thought inspired by this: What if the 2021 season played out in reverse?

The season starts with Wanda in late June lasting into July, breaking the pre-season streak. The Atlantic remains quiet during July and August, while the EPac keeps pumping out hurricanes like Rick and Pamela.

Folks get impatient as we head into late August, seeing the basin is at 1/0/0 with near-record low ACE. But at the tail end of August, Sam forms and becomes a 135kt long-lasting CV storm.

Conditions remain hostile after Sam, and model canes keep busting as they turn out to be much weaker, aka Peter and Rose. Weather fans start to write off Sam as a fluke and cancel the rest of the season. But after mid-September, Larry develops off the African coast and becomes another long-lived, annular major hurricane.

Right as October begins, Ida forms in the Western Caribbean, and later RIs into another 130kt Cat 4 slamming into Gulf Coast. Activity continues in October with Henri in the subtropics and a few storms in the Caribbean, namely Grace and Fred, the former become yet another major that RI'ed until landfall. Even in late October/early November, the basin still produces a rare, late-season MDR hurricane, Elsa.

A few shorties keeps bumping up the storm totals: Danny, Claudette, Bill, and Ana as a December off-season storm. The season finishes above-average in ACE, TS and MH counts.


This is roughly the 2021 season flipped around September 15. Not a perfect analogy, but you get the point. Clearly, such a season will be treated much more harshly by weather nerds, but the overall activity is the same.

I won't be surprised if 2022 turns out to be like this (not saying it will happen). 2019 and 2001 are very similar to this, as well.

[Steve]

How will we know until late October? We could have a record September but an early halt to the season will still leave us well below normal. Labor day is the 5th this year, and if we have no storms and nothing on the models then in my opinion something is wrong. The Tonga theory is interesting, it's never happened before (that much water vapor) but it will take years, or might be impossible, to say for sure that was it.

Because everything now. And first. That’s not a hit
on aspen for starting the thread. Since people post question threads like how many, where, when, etc. i wonder if I should pose the question - how ruined is your life with a slow starting hurricane season.

I kinda wish we got another July tropical storm up here in Connecticut like 2020/21 because this summer has been one of the driest in years and we desperately need a sustained rain event. I think the last one that was more than half an hour to an hour long was several weeks to over a month ago. A tropical storm would’ve been a much-needed rainfall boost up here, one that we still need. But otherwise my chatter about this season underperforming, as well as others’, is just due to curiosity, boredom, and interest in meteorology. A <50 ACE or <10 NS season isn’t gonna break my year, unless one of those storms is a Carol or Long Island Express repeat.

Yeah I saw about the whole state was in drought. It’s been pretty mild down in the deep south, but the mosquitoes have been a bish here in N.O. with all the rain. Odd thing is I don’t think we are in any kind of high rainfall yearly amount. It’s just been raining 2-3x a day for about 6 weeks.

[WiscoWx02]

Pretty sure this is just the way the season is going to be in my opinion. Quiet…a quiet season overall…possibly one of the quietest. At least in 2013 we could get some named storms, this year we can’t even do that. Just my opinion but I’m about to lock it up and say see you guys next year. If we are at September 10th and still haven’t had a named storm…yeah a 2013 repeat is a good bet.

[Astromanía]

It's like all the energy from the ATL was consumed by the 2020 season, 2021 ended quick but still deliver some action and now 2022 don't seem to have power to even form something strong (note that EPAC season activity has scalated with the years even though they have been niña years)

[storminabox]

I think the ridiculously warm subtropics could have something to do with why the basin is underperforming so significantly. Though I'm not sure of the exact mechanism that would cause that to yield such a shutdown (likely significantly reduces the stability in the tropics). In addition, all the other factors that Hammy mentioned previously are definitely contributing to the shutdown. At this point, I am not expecting things to pick up significantly, though I definitely could be wrong. The fact that such a favorable MJO configuration and VP setup (as well as near peak climo) isn't getting things done just screams to me that not much is going to change. We will see though.

[Stormcenter]

Quality vs. quantity is what’s important.

It’s not number but the strength that matters most
So many should stop focusing on those number of storm predictions which are nonsense to begin with.

[SoupBone]

Quality vs. quantity is what’s important.

It’s not number but the strength that matters most
So many should stop focusing on those number of storm predictions which are nonsense to begin with.

We're not the ones the put out those preseason numbers as a professional product. If this season's numbers tank, maybe we'll get some pushback on it.

[Category5Kaiju]

Whatever happens going forward, I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if forecasters decide to weigh ENSO "orders" more deeply when making seasonal predictions. For example, perhaps a future season that features an impending first year La Nina is treated with a higher potential to generate high levels of activity compared to a future season that features an impending third year La Nina. I think one thing we learned from this season is that having a prolonged La Nina may actually be very detrimental for an active Atlantic and that a periodic warm ENSO state, let alone an El Nino, is necessary to recharge the Atlantic for future years' worth of activity, even though that El Nino year may mean sacrificing an Atlantic season's above average activity.

With that being said, I think of La Ninas as "fuel tanks" that power the Atlantic, and as time goes on, if the "fuel tank" is left on, it will gradually deplete and eventually run out. A third year La Nina is like the tank running out of fuel. An El Nino is like a period where a muzzle is inserted into the tank to pour fuel into it, and then the subsequent first year La Nina is like the tank sending off its first bursts of fuel to the Atlantic engine. At least, hopefully that analogy makes sense

[WiscoWx02]

Whatever happens going forward, I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if forecasters decide to weigh ENSO "orders" more deeply when making seasonal predictions. For example, perhaps a future season that features an impending first year La Nina is treated with a higher potential to generate high levels of activity compared to a future season that features an impending third year La Nina. I think one thing we learned from this season is that having a prolonged La Nina may actually be very detrimental for an active Atlantic and that a periodic warm ENSO state, let alone an El Nino, is necessary to recharge the Atlantic for future years' worth of activity, even though that El Nino year may mean sacrificing an Atlantic season's above average activity.

With that being said, I think of La Ninas as "fuel tanks" that power the Atlantic, and as time goes on, if the "fuel tank" is left on, it will gradually deplete and eventually run out. A third year La Nina is like the tank running out of fuel. An El Nino is like a period where a muzzle is inserted into the tank to pour fuel into it, and then the subsequent first year La Nina is like the tank sending off its first bursts of fuel to the Atlantic engine. At least, hopefully that analogy makes sense

Makes perfect sense to me, I think you are spot on with this in a sense, the Atlantic has just run out of steam, or most likely the pattern is just changing and we are beginning to gravitate toward having a few quiet season…my outlook is this won’t be the only below average season in the near future. Look at 2010, 2011, 2012. The atlantic was dead for 3 years after those 3 above average seasons on a row. Could something similar be on the way now?

[REDHurricane]

Pretty sure this is just the way the season is going to be in my opinion. Quiet…a quiet season overall…possibly one of the quietest. At least in 2013 we could get some named storms, this year we can’t even do that. Just my opinion but I’m about to lock it up and say see you guys next year. If we are at September 10th and still haven’t had a named storm…yeah a 2013 repeat is a good bet.

Saving this take for December 1st

[skyline385]

You know the Atlantic is struggling when there is more activity in threads talking about a potential bust than the actual invest threads

[Hammy]

Whatever happens going forward, I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if forecasters decide to weigh ENSO "orders" more deeply when making seasonal predictions. For example, perhaps a future season that features an impending first year La Nina is treated with a higher potential to generate high levels of activity compared to a future season that features an impending third year La Nina. I think one thing we learned from this season is that having a prolonged La Nina may actually be very detrimental for an active Atlantic and that a periodic warm ENSO state, let alone an El Nino, is necessary to recharge the Atlantic for future years' worth of activity, even though that El Nino year may mean sacrificing an Atlantic season's above average activity.

With that being said, I think of La Ninas as "fuel tanks" that power the Atlantic, and as time goes on, if the "fuel tank" is left on, it will gradually deplete and eventually run out. A third year La Nina is like the tank running out of fuel. An El Nino is like a period where a muzzle is inserted into the tank to pour fuel into it, and then the subsequent first year La Nina is like the tank sending off its first bursts of fuel to the Atlantic engine. At least, hopefully that analogy makes sense

Makes perfect sense to me, I think you are spot on with this in a sense, the Atlantic has just run out of steam, or most likely the pattern is just changing and we are beginning to gravitate toward having a few quiet season…my outlook is this won’t be the only below average season in the near future. Look at 2010, 2011, 2012. The atlantic was dead for 3 years after those 3 above average seasons on a row. Could something similar be on the way now?

2013 was the result of thermohaline collapse and wasn't completely recovered until late 2014--not sure why people keep completely missing this point.

[Ed_2001]

Kind of an layman’s opinion. Third year niñas may be unusual, but six above average ACE seasons in a row (2016-2021) must be even more so, especially when 2020 and 2021 were back to back hyperactive years. At some point that streak will end. I still don’t think with this year’s La Niña that ATL will be anything like 2013, but an average or slightly below average year may be what we are looking at.

[Chris90]

I know that 2013 was affected by a different set of variables like the Thermohaline collapse, so I'm not saying that 2022 is the same or that the season will end as dead as 2013, I still expect at least a couple majors, but I do think that it's interesting that the N. Hemisphere kind of floundered as a whole for most of the summer of 2013 the same way 2022 has. The EPAC has produced, but it's definitely not the quality of a warm ENSO year. In 2013 the WPAC finally woke up in August and went nuts through November. I do wonder if we're seeing something slightly similar with the WPAC finally getting into gear with Tokage and now Hinnamnor. If the WPAC keeps it up it could have downstream effects that suppress the ATL to some degree.

I think when you expand your view beyond just the ATL and look at it globally, it's probably just going to end up a below year globally because the atmosphere is fluid and there has to be some kind of variation and balance. 2018 was insane globally. The Cat 5 production between WPAC/CPAC/EPAC/ATL was insane. It continued on in the Southern Hemisphere with the 2018-19 Southwest Indian Ocean season being the most active ever recorded. The ACE production globally was cranking. To have periods like that you also have to have quieter periods.

I know people have mentioned the sudden shut off of the 2021 season and theorized that whatever caused that continued into this year, but I'm not sure about that, because June was really giving signs that gave credence to the above average forecasts. The wave train was impressive. The wave that became Bonnie had an extremely impressive vorticity bundle at a very low latitude, and had she developed earlier and farther north giving her more time in the Caribbean without land interruptions, I think she could have been a respectable Cat 2/3 in the ATL. When she did get classified she started to demonstrate some impressive intensification for a tropical storm just putting a structure together and the only thing that stopped her was landfall and she recovered nicely in the EPAC.

So to me, there has been some change since then that has helped suppress the ATL, but I'm not sure it's a continuation from Oct 2021.

I think there's a lot of variables though. I think the Tonga theory could very well be a piece of the puzzle. I think the warm subtropics and the extreme heatwaves that have occurred in Northern latitudes could be a piece of the puzzle.

I will say though that I think sometimes people get too focused on finding one variable and laying all the blame on that. It's the atmosphere, it's a complex relationship between a whole bunch of variables and it's never going to be as simple as just one factor.

[MHC Tracking]

Pretty sure this is just the way the season is going to be in my opinion. Quiet…a quiet season overall…possibly one of the quietest. At least in 2013 we could get some named storms, this year we can’t even do that. Just my opinion but I’m about to lock it up and say see you guys next year. If we are at September 10th and still haven’t had a named storm…yeah a 2013 repeat is a good bet.

No.

[WiscoWx02]

Pretty sure this is just the way the season is going to be in my opinion. Quiet…a quiet season overall…possibly one of the quietest. At least in 2013 we could get some named storms, this year we can’t even do that. Just my opinion but I’m about to lock it up and say see you guys next year. If we are at September 10th and still haven’t had a named storm…yeah a 2013 repeat is a good bet.

No.

Perhaps I could be wrong for sure, won't deny that. I'm making a pretty bold statement.