Warming water temperatures off the coast of South America are signaling a potentially quieter Atlantic hurricane season — but that does not mean the Big Bend and South Georgia region is off the hook.
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Various changes in weather patterns in faraway parts of the earth have an effect on the amount and type of tropical activity in our area. The trends so far this season are showing more of a swing than a sway — and that has real implications for what we may experience in the months ahead.
How El Niño shapes hurricane season
Water temperatures off western South America have been warming up. When that happens over a stretch of months, warm air above the surface rises into the atmosphere. That rising motion sets off a chain of changes in the upper-air flow, affecting wind patterns in the Caribbean Sea.
A zone of stronger winds aloft tends to develop in the northwestern Caribbean. As tropical cyclones approach this zone, the force of those stronger upper-level winds disrupts a storm's circulation, usually causing it to weaken.
It is this effect that leads overall season activity projections for the number of named storms to be near or a touch below average levels.
Fewer storms doesn't mean no risk
Fewer storms are generally a good thing — but even quieter seasons carry real risks, and those risks are not much different from what a busy season brings.
Storms early and late in the season tend to form closer to our area, perhaps missing the disruption of upper-level winds entirely. An El Niño year does not mean the region is free of landfall threats.
Hurricane Idalia is a recent example. That storm hit land right here during an El Niño year, forming outside of the Caribbean wind shear zone entirely.
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