2022 Atlantic Hurricane Season May Snap Early Start Streak, Following Last Weekend's Gulf Disturbance

This small area of low pressure spun up over the central Gulf of Mexico Sunday and prompted the National Hurricane Center to highlight its first outlooked area of the 2022 season Sunday afternoon.

Dubbed Invest 90L – a term meteorologists use for a tropical disturbance being monitored – this low quickly moved ashore near the Alabama-Florida border late Sunday night.

Despite its small size, the disturbance did produce several 40- to 60-mph wind gusts along the northern Gulf Coast. One wind sensor on the roof of a fire station measured a 59-mph gust at Pensacola Beach, Florida.

There are no other areas in the Atlantic Basin of potential tropical development that the NHC is monitoring.

If that holds through the end of the month, it would snap a streak of seven straight Atlantic hurricane seasons which produced at least one named storm before the June 1 "official" start of the season.

Last May, Tropical Storm Ana formed east of Bermuda. In May 2020, the Carolinas were soaked by a pair of tropical storms, Arthur and Bertha.

It hasn't been just May in recent years. Five years ago, Tropical Storm Arlene formed over the central Atlantic Ocean just days after Easter in April 2017, one of only three April Atlantic storms on record.

In 2016, Tropical Storm Bonnie soaked the coast of the Carolinas in late May 2016. But that was preceded by eastern Atlantic Hurricane Alex, only the second known January Atlantic hurricane. Alex eventually made landfall in the Azores as a tropical storm.

As you can see in the track map below, not all of these recent early storms stayed away from land.

Preseason Storms Can't Predict the Season

Officially, the Atlantic hurricane season runs from June 1 through Nov. 30. That time frame was selected to encompass 97% of all Atlantic tropical storms and hurricanes, according to NOAA's Hurricane Research Division.

You can see in the graph below that a small number of tropical storms, and even hurricanes, have occurred in May and December.

To answer that, we looked at all hurricane seasons in the satellite era – from 1966 through 2021 – parsing out whether or not they produced at least one storm before June 1.

As you might expect, the 17 seasons with at least one pre-June 1 named storm ended up with an average of three to four more storms for the season than the 38 seasons without a preseason storm.

However, the number of hurricanes and major hurricanes (Category 3 or stronger) were virtually the same in seasons that started early compared to those that did not.

While the past six early-starting hurricane seasons ended up more active than usual, the 2015 season, which also started early, only produced 11 storms and four hurricanes due in large part to an intensifying El Niño.

(MORE: 30 Years Ago, Hurricane Andrew Proved 'It Only Takes One')

On the other extreme, the 2004 season's first storm, Alex, didn't become a tropical storm until Aug. 1. But what followed was a historic hurricane season that included Florida's four hurricane strikes – Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne.

So there's little useful information we can take away from the presence or lack of a pre-June 1 storm for the hurricane season.

Even if there's no storm for a while, there are indications another active hurricane season is ahead, including a potential triple-dip La Niña that could reduce shearing winds, which are hostile for tropical development.

From 1991 through 2020, the first Atlantic Basin storm typically formed by June 20, according to data compiled by the NHC.

It's a reminder that now is a good time to develop or refresh your hurricane plan well before the season's first storm or hurricane.

The Weather Company’s primary journalistic mission is to report on breaking weather news, the environment and the importance of science to our lives. This story does not necessarily represent the position of our parent company, IBM.