For the millions of Americans who live within a day’s drive of the Atlantic or Gulf coast, NOAA’s first hurricane forecast of 2026 carries a counterintuitive message: expect a quiet season, even though the ocean is unusually warm.
The agency’s Climate Prediction Center projected in May 2026 that the Atlantic basin will produce 8 to 14 named storms, 3 to 6 hurricanes, and 1 to 3 major hurricanes this year. It assigned a 55 percent probability that the season finishes below normal, a 30 percent chance it lands near normal, and just a 15 percent chance it runs above normal, according to the agency’s probability summary.
The accumulated cyclone energy range, a metric that captures the combined intensity and duration of every tropical system across the season, was set at 45 to 115. Both the storm count and the energy range sit at or below the 30-year average.
So why the subdued outlook when the Atlantic is running hot? The answer comes down to a tug of war between two powerful climate signals, and NOAA is betting one of them wins.
Warm water vs. El Niño: the forces pulling in opposite directions
Sea surface temperatures in the main development region, the corridor of tropical Atlantic stretching from the west coast of Africa toward the Caribbean where most hurricanes are born, are running above their long-term averages. Operational satellite-derived SST products from NOAA’s Office of Satellite and Product Operations confirm the anomaly. Warmer water feeds tropical cyclones more energy, and in recent seasons it has helped fuel hyperactive storm counts. Trade winds across the tropical Atlantic have also been weaker than usual, which reduces the natural churning of cooler water to the surface and further tilts conditions toward storm formation.
Working against all of that is a developing El Niño in the equatorial Pacific. The Niño 3.4 SST index, tracked by NOAA’s Physical Sciences Laboratory, has shown a warming trend since late 2025. When El Niño takes hold, it ramps up vertical wind shear across the Caribbean and tropical Atlantic. That shear acts like a blender on developing storms, ripping them apart before they can organize into anything dangerous.
NOAA relies on a tool called the Relative Oceanic Niño Index to separate the El Niño signal from the background rise in ocean temperatures worldwide. Without that adjustment, raw SST readings in the Pacific would overstate the warming trend because every ocean basin is running hotter than it used to. The adjusted index gives forecasters a cleaner read on whether the Pacific is genuinely shifting into El Niño territory or simply reflecting global ocean warming.
After weighing both signals, NOAA concluded that El Niño’s shear is likely to overpower the Atlantic’s warm water advantage during the peak months of August through October. That judgment is the backbone of the below-normal forecast.
History offers a useful, if imperfect, guide
El Niño has tamped down Atlantic hurricane seasons before. The 2015 season produced 11 named storms but only 4 hurricanes and 2 major hurricanes during a strong El Niño event. The 2018 season, influenced by a developing El Niño late in the year, also came in near or slightly below average despite warm Atlantic waters. In both cases, increased wind shear over the Caribbean disrupted storms that might otherwise have intensified.
But the pattern is not foolproof. The 2004 season unfolded during borderline El Niño conditions yet still hammered Florida with four hurricane landfalls. And the record-breaking 2024 season, which produced well above-average activity, showed how quickly warm Atlantic SSTs can overwhelm other atmospheric signals when shear fails to materialize on schedule.
The lesson from these seasons is that basin-wide storm counts tell you surprisingly little about what happens at your front door. A single well-aimed Category 4 hurricane in an otherwise sleepy season can cause more damage than a dozen storms that spin harmlessly over open water.
What forecasters still cannot pin down
The biggest unknown is timing. El Niño’s wind shear typically peaks in the upper atmosphere during late summer and early fall, precisely when the Atlantic season hits its busiest stretch. If the Pacific warming stalls or reverses before shear fully establishes itself, the warm Atlantic waters and slack trade winds could produce storms at a pace well above the 8 to 14 range. NOAA’s own outlook acknowledges that these competing factors create higher-than-usual uncertainty.
The public outlook document does not specify exactly how many degrees above average the main development region’s waters are sitting, or whether that anomaly has been growing or shrinking in recent weeks. Without that granularity, it is hard to judge whether the warm-water signal is strengthening faster than the El Niño signal. Both are moving targets, and the May outlook represents a snapshot of conditions and model guidance at the time of issuance, not a locked-in trajectory.
Regional features add another layer of unpredictability. The position of the Bermuda High, which steers storms toward or away from the U.S. coastline, and pulses of dry, dusty Saharan air that can choke developing storms are not predictable with confidence months in advance. NOAA plans to update its outlook in August, when more atmospheric data will be available and the El Niño trend should be clearer.
What coastal residents should do before June 1
A below-normal forecast is not a permission slip to skip preparation. NOAA’s probability breakdown still gives the season a roughly one-in-three chance of reaching normal or above-normal activity. And as forecasters have repeated for decades, it only takes one storm to make a season catastrophic for the community in its path.
Flood insurance through the National Flood Insurance Program carries a 30-day waiting period before coverage kicks in. Anyone without a policy who waits until the first tropical disturbance appears on satellite imagery will be too late. Homeowners and renters along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts should confirm that existing flood and wind policies are active and review coverage limits now, while there is still time to adjust.
Emergency managers and local weather offices also recommend updating evacuation plans, identifying shelters or inland contacts in advance, restocking supplies like water, batteries, and medications, and keeping copies of important documents in waterproof containers. For businesses and local governments, the weeks before the season are the window to test backup power systems, reinforce vulnerable infrastructure, and run emergency drills.
The science behind NOAA’s outlook supports cautious optimism about the overall storm count. It says nothing reassuring about the intensity or track of any individual storm that does form. Reading the forecast as a reason to prepare early, rather than a reason to relax, is the approach that best matches both the data and the historical record.
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*This article was researched with the help of AI, with human editors creating the final content.
