Thank you for joining our Situation Brief, the 2026 Tropical Storm Season and the shift from La Niña to El Niño.
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My name is Anne Sexton, and I’m joined today by my colleagues Jon Davis, our chief meteorologist, and Mark Russo, our chief science officer.
Today, Jon and Mark will take us through the tropical storm season outlook, and then we’ll take your questions.
Now, over to you, Jon.
Jon Davis
Great.
Thank you so much, Anne, and good day, everybody.
So it’s the time of year, it’s May, that we begin looking ahead to the northern hemisphere tropical season, hurricanes in the Atlantic, typhoons in the western portion of the Pacific, and beginning to assess the risk of, especially in those two areas, key areas from a supply standpoint on a global basis overall.
And why we do this at this time of year, typically the early portion of May is this is the transition season in the southern hemisphere places like northern Australia and Madagascar the season which is the last couple of months is just now coming to an end and this begins the transition to the northern hemisphere season which typically is a little bit later into the summer early portion of the fall in the Atlantic the Eastern Pacific and the Northwest Pacific here overall, as well as the Northern Indian Ocean.
So that is the area that we’re going to focus on overall.
But first things first, we’re going to take a very macro look at things, and then we’ll get more and more detailed as to the specifics of this season upcoming.
And there’s a couple of really interesting variables that will be driving the overall risk this year overall.
So, we’re going to start with the biggest pictures.
We’re going to begin with overall ocean temperatures and ocean temperatures, of course, are the drivers of tropical storm activity all areas of the world.
So, let’s start with the biggest of pictures overall.
So, this is the current global sea surface temperature anomaly map.
So, areas in red feature above normal temperatures.
Areas in blue, like up toward Alaska, in the North Atlantic; those feature below normal temperatures.
As you can see, in most of the world, and certainly most of the major oceans in the world, there’s a lot of warmth out there.
There’s a lot of warmth in the Pacific, in the Indian Ocean, in portions of the Atlantic basin overall.
And certainly, that warmth is a driver as we go toward an approach, the Northern Hemisphere hurricane and typhoon season here, you know, upcoming.
And when we look at global ocean temperatures, and if we compare that historically, the warmth that you see here, it has been going warmer and warmer for many, many decades.
So, if we take a snapshot today of overall sea surface temperatures, this is going back all the way to the early 1980s to the current situation.
This year is the red dotted line up top.
So, if we average out the overall global oceans and we look at every year from 1981 to this every day features the average of global ocean temperatures on the X axis, we start that in January, go to late December for every year out there.
Of course, the averages, you know, over the last 30 years and 40 years are much, much lower.
Decidedly, the global oceans have been increasing, they’ve been getting warmer and warmer, and we’ve reached a very interesting timeframe.
Actually, in the last week or two is that the global oceans now the current temperature on average has gone to the highest levels that we’ve seen in the historical record.
That’s the first time that’s happened in the last couple of years and the last couple of years, for example looking at 25 which is kind of the orange line there it was always basically kind of number two or number three it was never the tops.
So, the first time in the last two, two years, overall global oceans have gone to levels that are the warmest.
Some of that is the El Niño event, which we’re going to talk about at length here coming up, but then the general trend of warming oceans overall. Why do we care about this?
Well, we care about this because global oceans and the ocean temperatures that we have, that is what drives hurricanes and typhoons and all tropical activity.
The warmer the oceans are, the more octane or energy individual systems have for areas of the Atlantic, of the West Pacific, of the East Pacific here overall, and the more warmth that we have, that is the more potential energy that you can have in storms overall.
But what it has done, it’s increased the intensity of the strongest storms overall.
And of course, in the supply chain world, when we look at that, it’s always the category five hurricanes.
And this is just kind of looking at things in the Atlantic basin here, you know, overall, and what you’ve seen is not an increase in the overall numbers, but an increase in the extremely strong storms, and those extremely strong storms are the ones that cause the biggest damage, the biggest economic loss, unfortunately the most deaths and injuries, and by far the biggest impact to the supply chain.
So, this is an example of the intensification of storms that we see.
We call that rapid intensification at times.
If we compare the cat five hurricanes, the big events, the big disruptors in the supply chain.
And again, that would be categorized as winds in excess of 157 miles an hour, steady winds overall.
If we look at the last 25 years of last century, 75 to 2 ,000, we had seven Category 5 hurricanes in the Atlantic basin.
During the first 25 years of this new century, including last year, we’ve had 21.
So, three times more Category 5 hurricanes, the big events, the big disruptors within supply chain.
And again, this is a function of long-term warming of the global oceans, the Atlantic, but it’s also true in the other global oceans here overall across those areas.
So, from a macro picture, the global oceans have increased risk overall of the most devastating storms, the cat fours, the cat fives out there. That’s true in the Atlantic.
It’s also true in Pacific, and even in areas of the Indian Ocean overall.
So that’s starting this presentation in looking at the macro picture, the biggest picture of them all.
Let’s now begin to whittle things down a little bit and talk about some of the details that are really important here for this year.
So, when we look at overall ocean temperatures, and we go back to this map, so again, you know, a lot of red, there are individual areas which impact different tropical basins of the globe.
Now, we’re not going to go into great depth on water temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico, water temperatures in what we call the main development region, the MDR, things that are a little bit on the warmer side, but that’s not the big driver here going into this year.
And that’s more of a feature once we get into the core of hurricane season and core of typhoon season here later on.
The big driver this year is what’s happening in the Equatorial Pacific.
A major event looks like it’s going to be developing, has already developed across those areas, and it’s the El Niño event.
The warmer the normal waters in the central and eastern portion of the Pacific, that is going to be the dominant driver, the biggest variable, not only of the Atlantic hurricane season, but also of typhoons in the Pacific, both in the East Pacific, for example, on the west coast of Mexico and even into California, and in the West Pacific overall.
And again, from a supply chain standpoint, the number of major ports, the population across those areas in China, in the Koreas, in Japan, in the Philippines, you know, that is one of the biggest ramifications as to what will be happening overall with this developing El Niño event across those areas.
So for this specific season, the 2026 season, the big item on this map is the warmth in the equatorial Pacific, which is going to continue to ramp up by every indication out there and become a very strong event by the time we get to the heart of the season here in the Northern Hemisphere, July, August, September, and October.
And with that, let’s get into more details here.
I’ll hand it over to Mark, and we’ll talk about some of the specifics out there.
Mark Russo
Thank you, Jon.
Well, to show the relationship with this intensifying El Niño and what this means in terms of tropical activity across the basins around the world this season, we’re going to start here.
And we’ve shown this in previous hurricane outlooks, and for reference, we start with what we call ACE, or Accumulated Cyclone Energy.
Why do we use this metric?
This metric we feel is a better metric as it incorporates not only the numbers of tropical systems, but their intensity and their duration over their lifespan.
So, we think this is a great metric for risk.
And on this chart that you’re seeing right now, this is a chart of Atlantic Basin Ace since 2000.
All of the high number of years, those are active seasons within the Atlantic, typically a higher number of storms, higher number of stronger storms and also longer duration storms.
So, seasons such as 2004 and 2005 and 2017, those are the top three highest ACE seasons going back to 2000 in the Atlantic basin.
And then at the bottom part of the chart is the lowest ACE years.
Those are the inactive seasons here.
And so, you can see a lot of year-to-year variability, but overall, we’ve seen some very active seasons, also some inactive seasons, when we look at the average of all seasons since 2000, the ACE average is 150 here.
So that is a good starting point just going into any season.
Historically, since 2000, ACE values averaged out to be 150.
So that’s a good starting point.
Now we factor in with this developing El Niño and what does this mean for the Atlantic basin in terms of risk.
All of those red bars that you see are El Niño seasons since 2000.
And then all of the blue bars indicate the opposite of El Niño, La Niña or cooler waters across the equatorial Pacific.
So, this season in the Atlantic basin is going to be impacted by this El Niño and that is a suppressor of tropical activity across the Atlantic basin.
Reason being is that with the El Niño event that increases wind shear actually that across the Atlantic basin especially in around the Gulf of Mexico Caribbean but for the basin overall that suppresses activity and then then the most active seasons again at opposite. That was La Niña.
There’s actually been more tropical seasons here in the past 10 years or so.
But this year, again, what makes this year unique is that this is going to be an El Niño season. Last time this happened was back three years ago in 23.
ACE actually averaged out to be close to normal that season. But prior to that, 2015 was a very suppressed season.
Same with 2009, and then also 2002 was that way as well.
So bottom line with this El Niño event and rapidly intensifying El Niño event, this is we think suppressing the risk in general across the Atlantic basin.
Now, just to hone in a little bit more on US coastlines, both Gulf Coast and East Coast, here’s a little study on land falling storms, either tropical storms or hurricanes since 2000 and the influence of El Niño and La Niña.
Let’s take a look at the left map and table.
So, these are all El Niño and La Niña landfalls or tracks of storms since 2000.
And since 2000, there have been nine landfalls during El Niño seasons. La Niñas have featured 15.
So specifically in the Gulf of Mexico, so for if your business operations, supplier locations, facilities or transportation networks or hubs are located in the Gulf of Mexico region here.
Again, that’s a suppressor. Historically, there’s been a fewer number of landfalls there on the Gulf Coast during El Niño seasons.
On the east coast, El Niño, La Niña doesn’t make as much of a difference.
You can see that’s kind of equal distribution there, 16 and 17 between El Niño and La Niña seasons overall, and just looking at some of the tracks, though, you can see that at least within these seasons, well, either one, you tend to have, again, more activity in the southeastern part of the country.
Again, that’s kind of normally the case here, but up further up north, you can have impacts of systems, but again, it tends to be pretty rare.
But overall here, because of the El Niño event, some of the most suppressed risk is actually in the Gulf of Mexico region here because of this intensifying El Niño.
So that is a key takeaway from a risk standpoint looking ahead for this upcoming season.
Now, on the other side here of the globe, in and around the Pacific, whether it’s the Eastern Pacific or Western Pacific, that is where the highest risk is going to be this tropical season.
And that is due to this El Niño event, and if we take a look, a similar study here of El Niño events going back or all tropical seasons in the western pacific basin since 2000 and we look at all of the El Niño seasons that they tend to be very active here and certainly much higher ACE and much higher risk historically in the western pacific area compared to La Nino seasons, which are typically suppressed.
And so, with this upcoming season here in the Western Pacific, that is where the highest risk is going to be.
So, for any global operations, business operations, transportation networks in countries like China or Taiwan or around the Hong Kong area, but Korea is in Japan, that is where the highest risk tends to be.
And same is true for the Philippines and at times Vietnam and Thailand.
Although specifically for those areas of Vietnam and Thailand, La Niñas can tend to shift storms further to the west and impact those areas, such as what we’ve seen with typhoons the past couple of years during La Niña seasons there.
But with this year being an El Niño season, in countries such as Vietnam and Thailand, at least compared to the past couple of seasons, we think that that risk is a little bit lower here overall.
And rather that higher risk is further to the north.
Again, in around Taiwan, in China, the Koreas, in Japan, which have seen actually fewer systems or impacts here in recent years.
And then lastly here, Eastern Pacific and even Central Pacific for like states like Hawaii, but then for the Eastern Pacific in around Mexico and the southwest US El Niño events tend to enhance tropical activity.
And due to also some warmer than normal waters around also that is also a higher risk zone for being impacted by some of the heavier rainfall associated with remnants of storms that that move into that area.
One of the key takeaways is that Atlantic basin has reduced risk overall for tropical impacts, and that is being driven by this intensifying El Niño and what looks to be a very strong El Niño as we go through the remainder of this year.
And from a coast standpoint, a risk standpoint here in the US Gulf and East Coast, we are anticipating at least reduced numbers of storms driven by this El Niño event and higher wind shear.
However, we do need to keep an eye on every storm.
As Jon mentioned before and pointed out with some of the anomalous warmth in the Gulf of Mexico right now and Caribbean is that any storm that does develop and tracks over anomalously warm waters could result in more rapid intensification and ultimately a stronger storm.
So while there could be fewer numbers of storms, again, those storms that do develop could still be quite impactful depending on where exactly they track.
Also of note, another key takeaway, Eastern Pacific Basin here has increased risk versus climatology of tropical impacts.
So like I mentioned before places such as the Southwest US and Mexico, if your supply chain network involves those areas then overall there is a higher risk this season here of being impacted from the tropics here.
And also, due to some of these anomalously warm waters off the coast of Mexico and the Southwest US, also there’s increased risk of, especially off the coast of Mexico, some of the storms being very potent here and potentially more impactful.
Overall, that has a higher risk here compared to normal or climatology.
And again, that’s markedly different from the past two seasons, where we had more of a La Niña influence and suppressed activity across areas of the Western Pacific.
And then two other items to keep an eye on here before we open things up for questions.
Again, as Jon mentioned before, with this increasing number of category five storms, or category five storms, the strongest storms here, the most disruptive storms to supply chain networks.
That’s also something we need to keep in mind as we go through this season.
And we do feel there is an increased probability of rapid intensification due to still a lot of ocean warmth around in the tropical basins here in the Atlantic and also the Pacific.
So, another thing to keep an eye on and getting with every storm this season, we’ll be providing details on the risk rapid intensification in our watchtower alerts and in our advisory services.
Again, another impact of this trend in increasing ocean warmth and also something to monitor with every storm here as they make landfall.
So, with that, we’re going to open things up for questions. So, Anne, any questions?
Q&A
Yes, we’ve had a few come in. Let’s dive right in.
For the U.S. coast, what zone has the highest chance of having a hurricane?
That’s a really, really good question. So it certainly is not the Gulf of Mexico.
And even in the Western Gulf of Mexico, that is the area that’s least likely.
But if you had to pin one area, the highest probability, if you will, or chance of having an impactful hurricane, it would be the areas further east.
It would be the east coast of Florida, you know, up into the Carolinas possibly.
That would be the area that would be more and more likely, mainly due to the fact that El Niño has a greater suppressor impact in the Gulf of Mexico than it does in the Atlantic.
You know, it’s further away from the event here in the Equatorial Pacific.
So, yeah, East Coast of Florida into the Carolinas, that would be the area that’s more likely to have an impact of a hurricane than other areas on the U.S. coastline, especially, you know, over, let’s say, Texas and over, you know, the western areas of the Gulf of Mexico overall.
That’s an awesome question.
I’ve got another really good one for you.
Could the El Niño forecast be wrong?
Interesting question.
So no, El Niño is here right now. It’s going to remain in place.
The biggest question in our minds right now is just how strong is it going to be?
There’s been a lot of chatter Over the past month or so about this El Niño event potentially being a mega or a super event Which we haven’t seen one of those types of El Niño events since Since 2015 and in fact since 1980 there’s only been three mega or super events 2015 being the last 27 or 97 and then 1982 Back in 23, that was a strong El Niño, but not quite up to mega status.
So we think that’s the debate, like, do we reach 23 levels or is it more like 2015 levels?
It’s just a question of how strong it’s going to be.
I have a few more questions for you.
Will there be another major inland flood event in the Southeast?
Yeah, kind of thinking of Helene, and of course Helene with just devastating impacts across the southeast Appalachian area, still some areas have never recovered, you know, from that overall.
Of course, the overall risk in the Atlantic basin is lower this year because of the rapidly intensifying El Niño event.
That was the thief the thesis of Overall, Helene and the devastating impacts that we had across the area due to warm oceans, so we started the presentation overall due to very high levels Sorry, oh Yeah You can hear you I can hear you Jon.
And so the storms that we have tend to have more rainfall associated with them.
And the risk is if we tend to see a storm stall out, that was Harvey in Houston, that was Helene a couple of years ago.
And if they stall out with the more potent water, and they tend to have more moisture associated with them, that’s when you have these inland flood events.
And that risk has been increasing for the last couple of decades.
Do you anticipate hurricane seasons to last longer than traditional timing?
Yeah, another good question there.
The fact that this season here has very warm water temperatures, even with the suppressed activity expected in the Atlantic, that actually could cut things down a bit.
Those have an extended seasons typically with potential storms in November within the basin.
Again, due to the warmth and then with El Niño and enhancing activity across the Pacific basin.
That’s where that risk window will likely be extended here.
I’m afraid that’s all we’ve got time for.
So we should wrap up the session, but if you have further questions, please email us at [email protected].
And obviously we will get the recording over to you in a day.
Thank you very much for your attention.
It’s been a great session.
Thank you very much, Mark and Jon, and here’s to an interesting El Niño.