In my last post I gave some of the reasons I thought we would see a very active hurricane season. Here is what the NOAA folks think. They released their forecast for the 2010 season today.

As I expected it looks like it will be a mean year. Possibly one of the all time most active years. Here are NOAA’s numbers:

An 85% chance of an above normal season.

A 70% probability for each of the following ranges of activity this season:

• 14-23 Named Storms,
• 8-14 Hurricanes
• 3-7 Major Hurricanes
• An ACE range of 155%-270% of the median.

The ACE stands for Accumulated Cyclone Energy Index (Developed by NOAA).  It’s a measure of the total amount of energy from all the storms in a particular season. (In the same basin) NOAA’s official definition: The ACE index is a wind energy index, defined as the sum of the squares of the maximum sustained surface wind speed (knots) measured every six hours for all named systems while they are at least tropical storm strength.

An average year brings about 6 hurricanes and 10 tropical storms. So this is a forecast of a possible hyperactive season.

Could we still see a normal season?

Yes!

El Nino may linger and wind shear may not be as weak in the tropical Atlantic as forecasted. The odds are heavily against those things happening though.

For more on the reasons why see my previous post.