Lisa became the sixth Atlantic hurricane of 2022 on Wednesday morning as it approached Belize.
Hurricane Warnings were in place for the Belizean coast and the Bay Islands of Honduras, including Roatán. In addition to damaging, potentially hurricane-force winds, Lisa could also produce a storm surge 4 to 7 feet above the normal coastal tide.
Up to ten inches of rain could fall across parts of the Yucatan Peninsula, Central America, and Mexico. While the rain will likely produce flash flooding and landslides, it is a relatively modest amount—as hurricanes go - thanks to a good deal of dry air that still surrounds Lisa.
The forecast track for Lisa beyond landfall shows the remnant tropical depression potentially emerging into the part of the Gulf of Mexico called the Bay of Campeche. But very strong upper level wind shear would kill any chance for Lisa to redevelop into a storm or hurricane.
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Lisa, therefore, is still no threat to Florida.
Meanwhile, another tropical storm formed in the Atlantic midway between Bermuda and the Azores. Tropical Storm Martin, the 13th named system of the Atlantic hurricane season, is also forecast to become a hurricane. That in itself is remarkable because Martin is north of 35 degrees latitude, over waters that would historically be too cold to support a tropical cyclone in November. But in this era of man-made global warming, sea surface temperatures in that region are much hotter than historical norms.
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Thankfully, Martin is only of concern to maritime shipping lanes and it is forecast to spend the weekend in the North Atlantic southeast of Greenland and south of Iceland as it loses its tropical characteristics.
An average Atlantic hurricane season has 14 named storms out of which 7 become hurricanes. With Lisa already a hurricane and Martin forecast to be one, we are sure to reach that average annual hurricane figure. Hyperactive seasons in recent years have yielded as much as double that number. Notably in 2020, 14 of the record-setting 30 named storms (including some named after letters of the Greek alphabet) achieved hurricane status.
Utilizing that simple 2022 tally of the number of tropical storms and hurricanes would characterize this season as “average”. But by other measures the season has been slower than normal. The number of days with a named storm is 50 versus a normal of 65 by this date. 19 hurricane days have been observed versus a normal of 26 by this date.
Two major hurricanes have formed instead of the normal of three. And Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE), a measure that includes the strength and longevity of all storms combined, is at 88 versus a normal by this date of 116—that’s 25 percent below normal.
2022 did bring major Hurricane Ian, a historical hurricane for the state of Florida. It also yielded Hurricane Fiona, which not only brought more suffering to Puerto Rico just five years after Category 4 Hurricane Maria but went on to pound the easternmost provinces of Canada with hurricane conditions.
Going forward, a very broad area of low pressure is expected to form between the Greater Antilles and the Bahamas over the coming days. Whatever development occurs there is expected to be slow to happen as the system moves north and northwest past the Bahamas.
