May’s Hurricane History
Bottom Line: For years during hurricane season I’ve brought you historical perspective about the activity that’s taken place during the month. I’ll continue to do that this year with updated information that includes the 2018 hurricane season. I’m starting a month early this year. There are two reasons. First, we have a tropical wave off of our coast that’s being tracked by the National Hurricane Center. Second, someone asked me if that was unusual yesterday. The answer is no and given that “Hurricane Season” is arbitrarily defined as starting June 1st, despite common tropical activity in May, it made me think it’d be useful to show you what May has typically produced as well.
Here’s the first thing to know about tropical activity during the month of May. It’s fairly common and increasingly so in recent years. Historically (dating back to the original record keeping in 1851), we’ve averaged one named storm every six years. That includes 24 tropical storms and four hurricanes. So, it’s certainly possible. In fact, some years the season has kicked off even earlier. We’ve had recorded named storms every month of the year (including two hurricanes in January and one in March).
But here’s the more recent trend. You’re familiar with May showers but for four consecutive years we’ve had May tropical showers. In fact, Tropical Storm Alberto was the first storm to make landfall in the US last year (hitting the panhandle – which turned out to be an omen of sorts). For these reasons being prepared now really makes as much sense as being prepared in June. The storms don’t choose specific dates on calendars the way we do. Historically about 2% of all activity happens before hurricane season officially starts.