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Norcross: The tropics are quiet ... for now
What’s left of Elsa has evolved into a North Atlantic disturbance and will be swept away by the northern jet stream.
Local
What’s left of Elsa has evolved into a North Atlantic disturbance and will be swept away by the northern jet stream.
Elsewhere the tropics are quiet, as they normally are in the middle of July.
Over the last busy couple of decades of tropical systems, according to Dr. Phil Klotzbach of Colorado State University, the average date for the fifth named storm of the year has been Aug. 20. Elsa came along on July 1, so we are way ahead of schedule, even by modern standards.
Currently, the El Niño/La Niña cycle is in a neutral phase, which makes predicting how busy the rest of the season is going to be very hard. Historically, neutral-phase years have been both very busy and pretty quiet. On either end of the scale, we have more confidence in the forecast. El Niño years normally have fewer hurricanes, and La Niña years, like last year, generally have more.
The tropical Atlantic is on the cool side, however, compared to normal. And it’s much cooler than last year. So that might have a modifying influence on the number of systems that form, or how quickly they strengthen.