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HURRICANE FORECAST

Heightened activity likely to continue

Hurricane-weary residents of the Atlantic and Gulf coasts aren't likely to get much respite next year. Hurricane experts said Tuesday that the 2006 season was likely to bring five major hurricanes and a total of 17 named storms.

Researchers say the kind of record-breaking activity that produced this year's 26 named storms — and forced meteorologists to tap the Greek alphabet to name the last five — isn't likely to be repeated, but they do expect heightened hurricane activity to continue.

"The 2006 Atlantic hurricane season will be much more active than the average," says Colorado State University meteorologist Philip Kotzbach.

Overall, he says the six-month season, which begins on June 1, is likely to be nearly twice as active as the long-term average. Statistically, there is an 80 percent chance that at least one major hurricane will strike the United States — and a 64 percent chance that one will hit Florida. Kotzbach and colleague William Gray have been making extended-range forecasts of hurricane activity for 22 years.

Although they are not always accurate, their "year-ahead" outlooks often start conservatively and are updated as changing conditions warrant.

Last December, for instance, they predicted that 2005 would probably be "slightly more active than average," with 11 named storms. But even their successive updates calling for increased activity as the season unfolded couldn't quite keep pace with nature's furies.

As recently as October, Kotzback and Gray were predicting 20 named storms. As of Tuesday, a week after the official end of the season, the 26th named storm, Hurricane Epsilon, was still churning through the mid-Atlantic, far from land.

The coasts of Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Texas have been hammered by eight major hurricanes in the last two years: Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne in 2004, and Dennis, Katrina, Rita and Wilma in 2005.

Katrina's estimated death toll of more 1,300 people, mostly in Louisiana and Mississippi, was the highest in the United States since 1928. The $70 billion in insured damage from all storms last year was the highest ever.

Kotzbach says it is "statistically unlikely that the coming 2006 and 2007 hurricane seasons, or the seasons that follow, will have the number of major hurricane U.S. landfall events as we have seen in 2004 and 2005."

The two scientists, whose research is supported by the National Science Foundation and Lexington Insurance Co., say there is "no credible observational evidence" linking the increase in hurricane numbers or intensity to global warming, as some scientists have suggested.

But they say historical data do show that the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, the Caribbean region and Central America are in the midst of a natural cycle of heightened hurricane activity that began in 1995 and is likely to continue for "another 15 to 20 years."

And they say that many of the physical conditions that set the stage for this year's hurricane season — higher-than-average sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic and global circulation patterns — appear likely to be in place for the start of next year's season on June 1.