There’s a piece of welcoming news blowing in for residents of the South: Experts say that the odds of a major hurricane making landfall this season are significantly lower than usual. That comes on the tail of a relatively normal hurricane season last year and a severe one in 2024, the latter of which brought a whopping eighteen named storms in the Atlantic, including Hurricanes Helene, Milton, and Beryl.
The team of meteorologists at Colorado State University, which makes regular predictions about the severity of storm seasons, expects just seven named storms to materialize in the Atlantic and Caribbean through the end of November this year, on top of the two that have already happened. That prediction includes four category 1 or 2 hurricanes and one category 3, 4, or 5. That’s significantly fewer than the thirty-year national average, which rings in at fourteen named storms, seven hurricanes, and three Category 3 or stronger hurricanes.
The primary reason for the calmer outlook is a powerful El Niño weather pattern in the Pacific. While the warmer ocean temperatures typical of El Niño do often fuel hurricanes, El Niño also creates strong upper-level winds across the Atlantic once the warmer waters impact the atmosphere at large.
That resulting “wind shear” disrupts developing storm systems—and means that a strong El Niño can actually result in a decreased frequency and intensity of hurricanes here in the South. So far this year, wind shear rates have been as high as ever recorded.
Of course, no season is ever free of risk, and the weather is always unpredictable. But the new report does offer a little peace of mind to communities along the coast and to those still recovering from recent storms.
Lindsey Liles joined Garden & Gun in 2020 after completing a master’s in literature in Scotland and a Fulbright grant in Brazil. The Arkansas native is G&G’s digital reporter, covering all aspects of the South, and she especially enjoys putting her biology background to use by writing about wildlife and conservation. She lives on Johns Island, South Carolina.