An “Explosive” Hurricane Season & It’s All Settled w/Disney - Top 3 Takeaways – March 28th, 2024
- An explosive hurricane season. Above average, active, busy... these are all adjectives we’re familiar with hearing when we’re presented with hurricane season predictions. Explosive?! Now, that’s a new one...and it certainly isn’t the kind of characterization of hurricane season any of us want to receive from a major meteorological outfit...but it is the one we received yesterday from AccuWeather as they produced their 2024 Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast. Quoting the report headlined... Explosive Atlantic hurricane season predicted for 2024, AccuWeather experts warn... A super-charged hurricane season could spawn a near-record number of storms in the Atlantic this year, and forecasters may even run out of names for storms amid a frenzy of tropical systems. The Atlantic hurricane season officially gets underway on June 1 and runs through the end of November, and AccuWeather's team of long-range forecasters say now is the time to prepare for a frenzy of tropical systems. There are signs that the first named system could spin up before the season kicks off as the calendar flips to June, a precursor of what's to come. All signs continue to point toward the upcoming season being worse than the last, with the potential for the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season to rank as one of the most active in history. Good times, right. Now, more specifically, the “all signs” they’re speaking to includes something I first spoke to in my Top 3 Takeaways on February 13... As mentioned at the time...Don’t Go El Nino. A year ago, I was excitedly saying goodbye to La Nina and hello to El Nino, as meteorological forecasting was showing a strong likelihood that the El Nino weather pattern would be in place in time for last year’s hurricane season. And as we know, it was the calmest hurricane season on the east coast of Florida in eight years, as we were never under so much as a tropical storm watch during last year’s hurricane season. All told we’ve experienced the 5th strongest El Nino cycle on record which has accounted for our especially rainy “dry season” most recently. So, here’s the thing. Unfortunately, it looks like you can take what I said last year and reverse it. According to NOAA there’s a 79% chance that El Nino will be gone by the end of June, or the onset of hurricane season, and a 55% chance that La Nina will take its place by the peak of hurricane season. Fast forward to today and that’s precisely what AccuWeather sees (citing the report once again): Water near the equator of the eastern Pacific is in the process of quickly flipping from El Niño to La Niña. This swift transition may have significant implications across the Atlantic Ocean. They’ve also added into the mix this commentary... Sea-surface temperatures are well above historical average across much of the Atlantic basin, especially across the Gulf of Mexico, Caribbean and the Main Development Region. The Atlantic water temperatures observed in March were around or even warmer than they were in March ahead of the blockbuster 2005 and 2020 hurricane seasons. Not exactly fun thoughts. So, in this scientific equation...warmer than usual water temps combined with a flip from El Nino to La Nina = explosive...at least according to AccuWeather.
- As for the actual forecast...they’re calling for an average of 23 named storms this year, 10 of which will be hurricanes, six that are major and five that will directly impact the U.S. And about the area's most at risk of a direct impact according to the AccuWeather peeps... The Texas coast, Florida Panhandle, South Florida and the Carolinas are at a higher-than-average risk of direct impacts this season. All residents and interests along the U.S. coast, including Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands, should have a hurricane plan in place and always be fully prepared for a direct impact. So yeah, there isn’t any good news or hints of a possible reprieve for us in their report. The first hurricane I covered professionally was Floyd in 1999. I’ve covered every hurricane that’s impacted the Southeastern U.S. ever since (including Hurricane Wilma which ripped the roof of off the studio I’m in). What I’ve never covered is what’s been characterized as an “explosive” hurricane season going in. Let’s hope the fuze blows out on this one.
- All settled. Not that there’s ever been a time that you couldn’t say “gay” in a school in Florida if you wanted to, but there was a time when if you heard the word “gay” in association with Disney – you would have thought of happiness. After all, that’s the original meaning of the word and that was once Disney’s objective...through its resorts...to provide the happiest place on earth. A lot’s changed. Gay became a synonym for queer. Finland became the happiest place on earth and Disney went woke (becoming a political activist in the process). This of course led to the state of Florida ending Disney’s rein of self-governance. That then led to Disney’s lawsuits against the state. But it’s all settled now. Following a series of legal wins for the state of Florida against Disney’s efforts to challenge the state’s Central Florida Tourism Oversight District, which replaced the self-governing Reedy Creek Improvement District, all outstanding legal matters were settled yesterday. Quoting Disney: We are pleased to put an end to all litigation pending in state court in Florida between Disney and the Central Florida Tourism Oversight District. This agreement opens a new chapter of constructive engagement with the new leadership of the district and serves the interests of all parties by enabling significant continued investment and the creation of thousands of direct and indirect jobs and economic opportunity in the State. Quoting DeSantis’ office at the time of the settlement: We are glad that Disney has dropped its lawsuits against the new Central Florida Tourism Oversight District and conceded that their last-minute development agreements are null, void, and unenforceable. No corporation should be its own government. Moving forward, we stand ready to work with Disney and the District to help promote economic growth, family-friendly tourism, and accountable government in Central Florida. So here are. Gay still means queer to most who hear it. Finland is still theoretically the happiest place on earth (but having traveled throughout much of the world I’ll still argue it’s South Florida – though Tuscany makes a good case) and Disney is still probably woke. But they’re no longer going to act as woke political activists. That much is settled.