Hurricane update - 6 October

There are no active hurricanes at the moment. The two tropical depressions in the Pacific, southeast of Japan are ceasing to exist as tropical systems.

The update from the National Hurricane Center on the 2006 Hurricane Season was published earlier this week. The NHC is expecting one major hurricane and a few minor ones until the end of the season, on November 30th. The lower than average number of storms is attributed to an El Nino effect, where the waters of the Eastern Pacific off South America are warmer than average. The hurricane season in the Eastern Pacific, which runs concurrently with the North Atlantic one, has been pretty active, with 13 named storms so far.

On average, hurricanes strike land in the USA every third year. 2004 and 2005 were bad exceptions to the rule. This year, systems were born in the mid Atlantic, but headed north. Normally, a large area of high pressure sits over the Azores, blocking storms from a northward path. In 2006, the high has been weaker; Hurricane Gordon even passed right over the Azores. Here in the UK, we've now had 4 remnants of tropical cyclones passing over. Hurricane Gordon, again, possibly still possessed tropical characteristics when it raged over Ireland a few weeks ago.