Teban54 wrote:al78 wrote:130 ACE isn't very high for a season with 19 named storms.
This is literally not how ACE works, because storms like Emily, Jose and Katia generate minimal ACE. I don't understand why people think a 19/6/3 season with 130 ACE is somehow less active than a "normal TS-H ratio" 12/6/3 season with say 120 ACE.
al78 wrote: If you looked at number of hurricane days in the MDR region alone I reckon it would be more typical of a below-normal season and characteristic of an El Nino influenced season.
2005 had below-average H days within MDR proper. In fact, the only hurricane within MDR was Philippe '05, a short-lived Cat 1.
Btw, 2023 has above-average H count and H days, using the (inflated IMO) 1991-2020 climo.
al78 wrote:Another notable feature this year is the lack of anything significant developing or moving into the Caribbean Sea.
Franklin and Idalia both developed in the Caribbean, and later peaked as Cat 4s.
Your first point is not something I am claiming, I was saying looking at storm numbers alone does not give the full picture. 2017 had two fewer named storms than this year but an ACE index nearly 100 units higher, because several storms that year developed into strong hurricanes and had long tracks. This year has been characterised with a fair few storms that have developed and then forever struggled throughout their life, which is indicative of transient favourable conditions rather than frequent favourable conditions normally associated with an active season.
The second point, I was thinking of hurricane days only for the portion of the storm tracks that were within the MDR box (10-20N, 60-20W) which looks lower than normal to me although I don't have the numbers to be certain. As for 2005, that was unusual in having an extreme bias towards the Caribbean and Gulf, there was little in the MDR itself, again like 2018 the hurricanes that formed outside the Caribbean/Gulf mostly formed in the sub-tropical Atlantic, not the tropical Atlantic.
The third point, Franklin developed in the Caribbean but was a weak storm until it moved into the sub-tropics east of Florida where it strengthened into a cat 4, which is similar to storms that developed in the MDR in 2018. This suggests sub-optimal conditions on average for hurricane development in the deep tropics this year. Idalia is the one storm that was a significant hurricane in the Caribbean/Gulf region.