BLOG: Early Start To Hurricane Season

Last week I blogged about the Eastern Pacific hurricane season starting early and ironically the Atlantic hurricane season has begun early too.

The Atlantic hurricane season officially begins June 1st but this year the first named storm formed on May 19th which is about a week and a half away from the official start. Tropical storms have formed in the Atlantic as early as April and as late as December. July 9th, on average, is when the Atlantic has it's first tropical storm but if the right ingredients come together such as minimal wind shear and warm ocean waters then tropical storm development can occur.

That is what happened with Alberto. The National Hurricane Center declared Alberto a tropical storm after it formed over the Gulf Stream, which has a temperature of about 80 degrees  which is warm enough to for a tropical storm to form. Alberto was located about 95 miles southeast of Savannah, GA moving west-southwest at 6 mph.

Alberto was forecasted to stay off-shore and to weaken. As of this morning, it has been down graded to a tropical depression. It will accelerate northeastward and will dissipate in the next 36-48 hrs. The next named storm will be Beryl.