What’s wrong with the 2022 Atlantic Hurricane Season?

It is the Atlantic hurricane season, and all of the seasonal projection experts said the same thing. It’s going to be another above-average season. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) website notes, “Based on a 30-year climate period from 1991 to 2020, an average Atlantic hurricane season has 14 named storms, 7 hurricanes, and 3 major hurricanes.”

To date, three storms have been named, and they were all tropical storms. Alex formed a few days after the official start of the season (June 5-6) after it passed over the peninsula of Florida. Bonnie skirted very close to South America before re-emerging in the Pacific Ocean, and Colin was a sneaky little system that formed just off the coast of the Carolinas. It is early August. Based on the earlier projections, some of you may be asking, “What’s wrong with the 2022 hurricane season?”

The short answer to the question is, “absolutely nothing.” While the past few weeks have been normal to slightly-below normal, it may surprise some readers that activity is still trending slightly ahead of schedule relative to climatological normals over a 30-year period.

The third named storm of the season does not typically form until August 3rd. This year it formed around July 4th. On average, we do not expect the first hurricane and major storm (> category 3 on the Saffir-Simpson scale) until August 11th and September 1st, respectively. The next named system in the basin (4th storm) does not usually form until around August 15th. – Full report