Less intense hurricane season predicted
But August - October is the big season for Lee County
FLORIDA WEEKLY STAFF REPORT

SOURCE: NOAA All charted Florida Hurricanes since 1851.

August is the real beginning of hurricane season.

"This year's hurricane season has gotten off to a fairly slow start, due primarily to unfavorable thermodynamic conditions," said Philip Klotzbach, a Colorado State University storm forecaster. "Since the start of the active part of the hurricane season is governed primarily by thermodynamics, we believe that August will have activity at slightly above-average levels."

Since 1851, only eight hurricanes have hit Lee County and they've all been after Aug. 13 (That's when Charlie hit us in 2004).

Historically, if that's any indicator of future events and experts would probably say it's not, two storms have hit us in August, three in September and three in October. The latest was Oct. 18 (way back in 1920).

But there is good news.

The Colorado State University hurricane team has lowered its storm predictions for the last half of hurricane season that ends Nov. 30, at least slightly.

Pioneer forecaster William Gray said that we'll now have 15 named storms and eight hurricanes in the Atlantic basin, down for earlier predictions of 17 and nine.

"We have lowered our forecast from our early April and late May predictions due to slightly less favorable conditions in the tropical Atlantic," said Klotzbach, a member of Gray's team at Colorado State. "Sea surface temperatures have cooled across the tropical Atlantic in recent weeks, and there have been several significant dust outbreaks from Africa, signifying a generally stable air mass over the tropical Atlantic."

The team also lowered its forecast of five intense hurricanes (Category 3-4-5) to four.

Last year, seasonal hurricane predictions proved to be too high when an unexpected El Niño rapidly developed and created a hostile environment for Atlantic storms to form and strengthen. When storms did develop, steering currents kept most of them over the open water and away from land.

No hurricanes made landfall along the U.S. coastline in 2006. The 2006 season witnessed a total of 10 named storms, 5 hurricanes and two major hurricanes. The 2005 season, considered unusual by the Colorado State forecast team, witnessed 27 named storms, 15 hurricanes and seven intense hurricanes. Long-term averages are 9.6 named storms, 5.9 hurricanes and 2.3 intense hurricanes per year. ¦