Today marks day one of the 183-day Atlantic hurricane season, which runs through Nov. 30. Forecasters expect overall hurricane activity across the Atlantic basin to be softened this season by a potentially historic El Niño building in the eastern equatorial Pacific, which acts to deter would-be storms on the Atlantic side by ramping up hostile wind shear.
Nearly all major seasonal forecast groups ― including Colorado State University that issued its first forecast in early April and NOAA, the parent agency of the National Weather Service ― are predicting below-average seasonal hurricane activity for the Atlantic basin in 2026.
El Niño takes center stage
The 800-pound gorilla this hurricane season will be the fast-building El Niño ― abnormally warm waters around the equator in the eastern Pacific Ocean ― expected to be officially declared in the next month or two.
Over the past two weeks, waters have averaged around a degree Celsius above average in the main El Niño monitoring region (called the Niño 3.4 region), which is significant, especially for the time of year. NOAA looks for waters in this main monitoring region to hit at least half a degree Celsius above average over a three-month period before declaring El Niño conditions, so their thresholds take a little longer to reach.
Nevertheless, we’re well on our way to what models forecast will be a blockbuster El Niño later this year and into early 2027 (El Niño conditions typically peak from November to January). Forecast models indicate a near certainty (greater than 90% chance) of a strong to very strong El Niño by the peak months of the Atlantic hurricane season (August-September-October), and a greater than 80% chance of a so-called “Super El Niño” during what’s traditionally the most active part of the season this fall.
El Niño conditions affect the Atlantic hurricane season in several ways, but most consequentially they sharply increase storm-busting wind shear in the areas normally favored for hurricane development. During strong to very strong El Niños like the one forecast, wind shear is especially strong in the western part of the Atlantic and across the Caribbean Sea.
It’s worth noting that during the last strong El Niño in 2023, hurricane activity wasn’t reduced due to a ridiculously warm tropical Atlantic which counteracted El Niños usual influence. This is something we discussed in detail and forecast could happen at the time. This isn’t expected to be in the case in 2026, with waters running near average across the main development region of the Atlantic.
Down but not out
Less hurricane activity doesn’t mean no hurricane activity. Although U.S. landfalls tend to be reduced during El Niño years, it doesn’t eliminate the risk altogether.
Even during strong El Niños we’ve seen big hurricane hits, like in 1965 with Hurricane Betsy taking an unconventional loop-the-loop east of Florida before clocking South Florida and making a final hit on South Louisiana, causing extensive flooding in the New Orleans metro and becoming the costliest Atlantic hurricane on record at the time (and the first billion dollar U.S. disaster, unadjusted for inflation).
As Betsy showed and as the wind shear anomaly map above suggests, storms that develop in the subtropics (the region just north of the main tropical belt and east of Florida) have a better shot of evading the amped up subtropical jet stream and organizing during El Niño years. Here in southeast Florida we’ll want to keep an eye to the east ― especially come August and September ― for storms that might thread the needle.
No organized activity expected this week
The first full week of the 2026 hurricane season should be mostly quiet. Rich tropical air will remain over the Gulf this week, but plentiful wind shear will keep the Gulf closed for now.
A potent cold front will usher in drier air to much of Florida and the eastern Gulf by late this week and the weekend (though only a brief relief for us in southeast Florida). We’ll keep an eye out early to mid- next week for this stalled front that’ll be draped across Florida into the western Atlantic. These stalled fronts can be a source of early season tropical mischief, but for now long-range models aren’t suggesting anything to be concerned about.
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