Forgive this skepticism. But when hurricane forecasters say they believe the 2023 Gulf of Mexico summer “is expected to be less active than in recent years,” you have to worry if that rosy prediction is tempting fate.
After all, the 2022 hurricane season was the best possible outcome for Mississippi. No storms of significance hit the state, and there was that weird lack of activity for most of July, when no tropical storms at all developed off the west coast of Africa.
Only three hurricanes made landfall last year. Two of them were minimal-strength Category 1 storms that hit Puerto Rico and Florida, while the other was Category 4 Hurricane Ian, which caused massive damage on the west coast of the Florida peninsula.
For 2023, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration predicts a 40% chance of a normal hurricane season. It says there is a 30% chance of an above-normal number of storms, and the same 30% chance of fewer storms than normal.
If the NOAA’s projections are accurate, that means a 70% chance that the states along the Gulf of Mexico and the East Coast will avoid an excessive number of hurricanes this year. You can’t ask for better odds than that.
The ultimate outcome, of course, depends on where the hurricanes that do form make landfall, and especially how strong they are. A claim that last year’s hurricane season was rather tame makes no sense to anybody in Florida whose home got destroyed by Hurricane Ian.
This year, NOAA expects 12 to 17 storms will develop winds of 39 mph or greater, meaning they’ll get a name. It believes five to nine of those could become hurricanes, with winds of 74 mph or higher. And one to four of those hurricanes could turn into powerful Category 3, 4 or 5 storms, with winds of 111 mph or more.
If the recent past is any guide, be on the lookout for Hurricane Idalia this year. The storms whose names begin with an “I” have caused an excessive amount of damage since 2001 — to the point that 11 names beginning with I have been retired since 2001 because of the damage or deaths that they caused.
Ian last year, and Hurricane Ida in 2021, which came onshore near Houma, La., and parked for several hours over Hammond, La., are the two most recent examples of this trend.
Jack Ryan, Enterprise-Journal
