Christopher Doering, PlanetArk 28 May 10;
The Atlantic storm season may be the most intense since 2005, when Hurricane Katrina killed over a thousand people after crashing through Gulf of Mexico energy facilities, the U.S. government's top climate agency predicted on Thursday.
In its first forecast for the storm season that begins next Tuesday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration forecast 14 to 23 named storms, with 8 to 14 developing into hurricanes, nearly matching 2005's record of 15.
Three to seven of those could be major Category 3 or above hurricanes, with winds of more than 110 miles per hour (177 km per hour), the agency said, echoing earlier predictions from meteorologists for a particularly severe season that could disrupt U.S. oil, gas and refinery operations.
"If this outlook holds true, this season could be one of the more active on record," said Jane Lubchenco, NOAA's administrator. "The greater likelihood of storms brings an increased risk of a landfall."
In addition to the risk that major hurricanes can pose to about one-quarter of U.S. oil production and more than a 10th of natural gas output offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, this year's storms could threaten to complicate efforts to combat the environmental disaster of BP's gushing oil well.
The hurricane season officially starts on June 1 and typically peaks between late August and mid-October. An average Atlantic hurricane season brings 11 tropical storms with six hurricanes, including two major hurricanes, NOAA said.
The 2009 season, which had only three hurricanes and was the quietest year since 1997 due in part to the weather anomaly El Nino, followed several years of unusually intense activity that was particularly disruptive for U.S. energy supplies.
Other U.S. weather forecasters, including private and university researchers, also are predicting an active hurricane season.
Private forecaster WSI and Colorado State University's hurricane-forecasting team so far expect the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season to produce at least eight hurricanes, four of them major, posing a heightened threat to the U.S. coastline.
CSU forecasters are expected to ramp up their prediction for the 2010 season in a report due out on June 2.
"The numbers are going to go up quite high," William Gray, the hurricane forecast pioneer who founded CSU's storm research team, said on Wednesday. "This looks like a hell of a year."
Despite being off target in recent years, hurricane forecasts are closely watched by energy, insurance and commodities markets. Interest surged following damaging hurricane seasons in 2004 and 2005 that hammered Florida, the U.S. Gulf Coast and the Gulf of Mexico oil and gas fields.
A record four major hurricanes hit the United States in 2005, including Katrina, which killed around 1,500 people on the U.S. Gulf Coast and caused $80 billion in damage, making it the costliest natural disaster in U.S. history.
(Additional reporting by Tom Brown; Editing by Walter Bagley)
2010 hurricane season may be worst on record
Yahoo News 27 May 10;
WASHINGTON (AFP) – The 2010 Atlantic hurricane season may be one of the worst on record, US officials warned Thursday, amid fears it could deepen an oil crisis in the Gulf of Mexico and bring new misery to Haiti.
An "active to extremely active" hurricane season which starts on June 1 is expected for the Atlantic Basin this year, US officials said.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) predicted 14 to 23 named storms, including eight to 14 hurricanes, three to seven of which were likely to be "major" storms, with winds of at least 111 mph.
This is compared to an average six-month season of 11 named storms, six of which become hurricanes, two of them major.
"If this outlook holds true, this season could be one of the more active on record," said NOAA administrator Jane Lubchenco.
"The greater likelihood of storms brings an increased risk of a landfall. In short, we urge everyone to be prepared," he said.
Hurricane fears are particularly acute this year in the Gulf of Mexico, where millions of gallons of oil from a leaking BP undersea well is pushing into ecologically sensitive marshlands.
And in Haiti, hundreds of thousands of people are still living in makeshift camps more than five months after a devastating earthquake.
NOAA said the prediction that there will be more and bigger storms this year than average was based on several factors.
President Barack Obama's spokesman Robert Gibbs said the government is mobilizing for the potential impact of any hurricanes.
"The president stressed that the government must ensure we consider the effects the BP oil spill could have on storms, response capabilities, and recovery efforts in planning for this year's season," Gibbs said.
He added however that "those considerations do not change the primary mission of emergency management officials during a response, which is to support state efforts to protect lives and property."
Forecasts said that windshear, which helped suppress hurricane activity in 2009 by tearing up storms before they developed, is expected to be weaker this year as the El Nino effect dissipates in the eastern Pacific.
El Nino is a cyclical phenomenon that brings unusually warm ocean temperatures to the equatorial Pacific, but cooler temperatures to the Caribbean and the Atlantic.
Its opposite is La Nina, when Pacific temperatures are unusually cold. In those years, the US southeast is unusually warm, enabling storms to grow and move.
Sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic are already up to four degrees Fahrenheit above average, NOAA said.
"Whether or not we approach the high end of the predicted ranges depends partly on whether or not La Nina develops this summer," said Gerry Bell, a hurricane forecaster at NOAA's Climate Prediction Center.
"At present we are in a neutral state, but conditions are becoming increasingly favorable for La Nina to develop."
And NOAA said the period since 1995 has been one of unusually high storm activity with eight of the last 15 seasons ranking in the top ten for the most named storms. In 2005, there were 28 named storms.
