Două uragane din Atlantic se formează miercuri, într-o rară explozie tropicală din noiembrie

Topline

Not one, but two hurricanes formed in the Atlantic basin over the course of a few hours Wednesday morning, a rarity at any point in the year but especially toward the end of the hurricane season in early November, though neither storm poses an imminent threat to the United States.

Fapte-cheie

Hurricane Lisa formed over the western Caribbean Sea at 8 a.m. EDT, while Hurricane Martin organized three hours later over the open waters of the central Atlantic Ocean.

Lisa is packing maximum sustained winds of 80 mph as it nears landfall in Belize, while Martin has 75 mph winds and is not expected to pose major threats to land at any point.

The entire Belize shoreline and the extreme southern portion of Mexico’s Yucatan peninsula is under a hurricane warning, with “life-threatening storm surge” of up to 7 feet above normal tide levels expected, along with damaging winds and up to 10 inches of rain.

The hurricane is expected to strengthen slightly over the next few hours ahead of a Wednesday evening landfall—the National Hurricane Center expects the hurricane’s remnants to emerge over the southern Gulf of Mexico as a tropical depression Friday morning and meander there through the weekend.

Hurricane Martin is forecast to strengthen into a 105 mph Category 2 storm by Thursday, bringing it very close to the 111 mph threshold that would make it a Category 3 major hurricane, but it should quickly weaken over the cold waters of the north Atlantic this weekend.

Fundalul cheie

The second half of hurricane season—which started September 1—has been much more active than the season’s historically quiet first half. September in particular brought devastating storms like Hurricane Ian, which hit southwest Florida, and Hurricane Fiona, which damaged infrastructure in Puerto Rico. But dire predictions for one of the most active hurricane seasons in history have not come to fruition so far. As of Wednesday the 2022 season is still below average in terms of named hurricanes and tropical storms (13) and major hurricanes (2), while the 7 hurricanes that have formed are exactly the number expected in an average season. A typical season are 14 named storms and 3 major hurricanes.

Contra

The strongest storm of the 2020 hurricane season—Hurricane Iota—formed in November, with winds peaking at 155 mph on November 16. It was also the 30th and final named storm of the season, the most ever recorded in a single year.

Ce să urmăriți

Forecasters are monitoring an area of disturbed weather near the Greater Antilles that is expected to move over the southern Atlantic during the next week or so, where “some slow subtropical or tropical development of this system is possible.” The National Hurricane Center gives the system a 20% chance of developing over the next five days. Hurricane season ends November 30.

Lecturi suplimentare

Amenințarea tropicală se stinge pe măsură ce sezonul uraganelor surprinzător de liniștit se apropie de vârf (Forbes)

Activitatea uraganului ar putea crește vertiginos în săptămânile următoare după pauză din iulie, spun meteorologii (Forbes)

Uraganul Ian: Acestea sunt zonele din Florida cel mai greu afectate de furtuna de categoria 4 (Forbes)

Uraganul Fiona atinge categoria 4 de forță pe măsură ce mai multe amenințări tropicale se produc în Atlantic (Forbes)