FLHurricane.com: Initial Outlook for the 2008 Season

Greetings & Salutations

I've been loathe to change my original expectation of 13/8/3, but Clark sets the example for me in conceding that long range stuff isn't my thing, either, and if he can concede that, surely this armchair hurricane season prognosticator can.

The following is wordy, and I'm mostly talking to myself as I write this -- talking out my logic --

I have found that my original reasoning back in February no longer applies as well, as La Nina has been easing up a good deal faster than most anticipated, and certainly much quicker than CPC's official forecast, itself.

Additionally, it now appears that a significant monsoon trough is trying to set up over and either side of central America. As mentioned elsewhere on Flhurricane, several models are already sniffing this out for enhanced early-season cyclogenesis in both the Caribbean-SW GOM, and far eastern Pacific...

And we are seeing upward pulses in the MJO over this region.

These could flip on its head my earlier sense that the region west of the Antilles would be slow to get going.

Over to the eastern Atlantic, the northern Saharan region has been quite dry. On one hand, some resulting extra heat and wind may scoot waves farther along without dying out than had this not been the case, but on the other, there might just be enough extra dust floating off to subdue more frequent development out in the farther central-eastern Atlantic than I initially thought... However, this may be more than offset by anomalously high precipitation falling over a region bounded by 10N and 25N over western Africa.

Also of note, the ECMWF forecast
is calling for statistically significant lower pressures over much of the central & eastern Atlantic, as well as much of the southwestern GOM, for the season...

as well as neutral ENSO during the important July-Aug-Sept period, which suggest that La Nina's influence on the heart of the season may be very weak or essentially gone by Aug-October.

Lacking the skills to really make a case one way or the other, based on the above and prior experience, I am tweaking my February guesstimate from 13/8/3 to 16/8/4... with action now much more possible than I earlier thought, in the area western Atl.... in the Caribbean & into the GOM.. and greater chances for waves to become named storms while crossing just about anywhere in the entire length of the Atlantic.

I would guess for a higher number of named storms becoming hurricanes if I had a better sense that overall shear would be much lower and/or the QBO phase was going to be more conducive.

--Now watch as I eat crow and wish I kept with my February numbers!

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