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AP Miami
"Right now there's a break, there's no threatening systems out there," said Jorge Aguirre, a meteorologist at the National Hurricane Center in Miami. "But this may only be a brief break. It's not over until it's over."
And it's not over until Nov. 30, a long two months for Floridians who have had to deal with the stress of preparing for the onslaught of storm after storm. Millions have been told to evacuate week after week, and many have suffered damage to homes and property. Residents in Martin County have seen two major hurricanes hit in nearly the same spot, something forecasters say is perhaps unprecedented. State officials blame 91 deaths on Hurricanes Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne.
Aguirre said the season usually peaks between mid-August and September. He said another peak usually comes in October, and that the only difference is that by then, storms usually form in the Caribbean and off the coast of Mexico, instead of off the coast of Africa.
That's because wind shears in October and November tend to make the Atlantic inhospitable for hurricanes, said Chris Landsea, a research meteorologist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Miami.
Landsea noted that the warmer waters of the Caribbean and gulf can create strong storms, such as Category 3 Hurricane Opal in October 1995, which caused at least 50 deaths in Guatemala and Mexico and 20 deaths in the United States, and Category 5 Hurricane Mitch in late October 1998, which killed least 9,000 people in Central America.
The shorter distance those storms need to travel before hitting land can leave little time for people to prepare, unlike Atlantic storms, which usually allow days for preparations.
Landsea said that history does show that hurricanes tend to come in clusters, which means the next couple of weeks could be quiet.
But, he said, when the first two-thirds of a season is active, like this year, October and November tends to be busy as well.
Hurricane center Director Max Mayfield said that they expect another two to three named storms -- that won't necessarily become hurricanes -- in October.
"Nobody's going to know where they're going to hit," he said. "If they can, let me get them a job."
The good news is that once early November comes, "the large threat from a major hurricane goes way down," Landsea said.
More good news is that El Nino-like conditions are taking place in the eastern and central Pacific, said Phil Klotzbach, research associate of Colorado State University's noted hurricane forecaster William Gray. El Nino refers to the warming of the Pacific waters and leads to hurricane-unfriendly wind shears over the Atlantic and Caribbean, he said. In the past week, shears have increased over the eastern Atlantic, he said.
"In general, when El Nino takes place, the season tends to end a little earlier," he said.
But some forecasters are already watching an area of cloudiness in the southwest Caribbean, where water temperatures have been above normal.
"Even though the odds of getting these hurricanes or storms hitting the states diminish, you can't leave your guard down," said Tom Kines, senior meteorologist at AccuWeather Inc., a commercial weather forecasting center. "You have to pay attention to the tropics for the next few months."They say that after a quiet next 2 weeks activity will pick up.I found this statement from them interesting.
:)
