MIAMI - A team of experts predicted Wednesday that 15 tropical storms would form during the coming Atlantic storm season, of which eight would strengthen into hurricanes — and four of those would be major.
The noted Colorado State University hurricane research team increased its outlook by two tropical storms and one hurricane over its last bulletin issued in December. It cited improved conditions for storm development, including warmer sea surface temperatures in the eastern Atlantic.
The team, which was founded by forecasting pioneer Bill Gray, predicted in December that the six-month season beginning on June 1 would produce 13 tropical storms, of which seven would become hurricanes and three would be major hurricanes with winds of at least 111 mph.
The average hurricane season produces about 10 tropical storms and six hurricanes, but researchers believe the Atlantic is in a period of heightened storm activity that began around 1995 and could last 25 to 40 years.
Last year, 15 tropical storms storms formed and six became hurricanes. Gray said recently that La Nina cool-water conditions in the Pacific and sea surface temperature increases 0.5 to 0.9 degrees Fahrenheit off Spain and northwest Africa in the past few months could enhance hurricane formation during the coming season.
“The Atlantic is a bit warmer than in the past couple of years,” said Phil Klotzbach, a member of the forecast team. “That is something we would like to keep an eye on.”
The team also said that there’s a better than average chance that at least one major hurricane will hit the United States.
One of the most closely watched hurricane forecasters, Gray has been issuing hurricane predictions for more than 20 years. But he and others have been criticized in recent years for having forecasts that were off the mark.
Gray’s team says precise predictions are impossible, and the warnings raise awareness of hurricanes.
“We have not been ashamed of our forecast failures. It is the nature of seasonal forecasting to sometimes be wrong,” Klotzbach said in a telephone interview from the Bahamas, where the team announced the forecast at a weather conference.
Before the 2007 June-November season, U.S. government scientists predicted 13 to 17 named storms and six hurricanes, three to five major. Gray was further off, forecasting 17 named storms, including nine hurricanes, five of them major.
U.S. government forecasters issue their seasonal outlook in late May.
National Hurricane Center director Bill Read, who is in his first year on the job, has said he would prefer to characterize the season in general terms — as above average, average or below average — instead of trying to forecast a precise number of storms.
“It doesn’t matter what the numbers are,” center spokesman Dennis Feltgen said Wednesday, repeating a center mantra that it takes only one powerful storm to make it a bad season
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