Threats From Ernesto Impacting US Coastal Areas

S​trong, destructive hurricanes have happened before in quiet hurricane seasons, a cautionary tale that every year can be dangerous, regardless of seasonal outlooks.

T​he 2022 hurricane season slumbered through only the third August without a single named storm since 1950. Through the end of August, only 1988 had less activity than 2022.

B​ut, as often is the case, it turned around quickly in September, with hurricanes Danielle, Earl and Fiona.

S​o, let's take a look at some notable, even infamous, hurricanes and tropical storms that have happened in seasons with less activity.

(​MORE: The Most Quiet Atlantic Hurricane Seasons)

Andrew

Perhaps the poster child for a destructive hurricane in a quiet season, Andrew was one of only four hurricanes to make a mainland U.S. landfall at Category 5 intensity, when it raked through South Florida in 1992.

A​ndrew claimed 23 lives in the U.S. and was the nation's costliest hurricane at the time, with damage now estimated at $55.9 billion after adjusting for inflation.

A​ndrew was one of only seven storms to form that season, half of what's considered an average tally of storms in a present-day hurricane season.

Alicia

T​he 1983 hurricane season only produced four storms, the least number of any hurricane season in the era of weather satellites.

B​ut one of those was a billion-dollar disaster in one of America's largest cities.

Hurricane Alicia went from a tropical depression in the northern Gulf of Mexico to a landfalling Category 3 hurricane near Galveston, Texas, in mid-August 1983.

Wind gusts over 100 mph shattered windows in downtown Houston skyscrapers. Nine feet of storm surge pushed onto the Gulf side of Galveston Island.

Alicia caused $8.8 billion (2022 dollars) in damage in the U.S. and claimed 21 lives.

B​ob

Only eight storms developed in the 1991 hurricane season.

O​ne of them was Hurricane Bob, which scraped the East Coast before plowing ashore in southern New England at Category 2 intensity.

B​ob sent an up to 8-foot surge into Rhode Island. Its winds knocked out power to an estimated 2.1 million customers from North Carolina to New England. Bob was responsible for 17 deaths in the U.S., with total damage estimated at $3.2 billion (2022 dollars).

A​gnes

In a year with only seven storms, the season's first became one for the history books.

H​urricane Agnes made a Category 1 landfall in Florida. Its second life as a tropical storm off the Mid-Atlantic coast, then pivoted westward into the Northeast produced massive flooding from Virginia to New York state.

A dike was breached in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and extensive flooding was observed along the Susquehanna River, including in Elmira, New York, and Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. Flooding also occurred on the James River in downtown Richmond, Virginia.

Agnes and its remnants resulted in 122 deaths and $14.7 billion (2022 dollars) in damage in the U.S., most of which came from flooding.

O​ther examples include Category 5 Hurricane Anita, which slammed northeast Mexico in the second least active season in 1977, and Category 3 Hurricane Emily's strike on Hispaniola in 1987.

R​egardless of how quiet a season has been, that doesn't mean one storm couldn't hit your area. If it does, you'll never remember it as a quiet hurricane season.

T​his is why we urge you to remain prepared during this and every hurricane season, regardless of how active it is. Information about hurricane preparedness can be found here.

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.