OUR VIEW: NOAA expects busy hurricane season, so keep an eye out

Published 10:30 am Friday, May 21, 2021

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It’s fairly unlikely that a hurricane is going to make its way this far inland into the area of the Alabama-Georgia state line.

However, in recent years, we’ve seen where several strong hurricanes have tracked this direction as they were downgraded to tropical storms or tropical depressions. Even in those situations, they brought heavy rain and heavy wind and can cause damage and be dangerous.

If models and forecasters are right, it could again be a strong season for hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued its seasonal Atlantic hurricane forecast on Thursday, and it’s predicting 13-20 total named storms, 6-10 hurricanes, and 3-5 major hurricanes (Category 3 or higher).

If that becomes a reality, our friends on the gulf coast better be paying attention when hurricane season gets underway in a few weeks.

For us, it’s also a dose of reality. While our spring is mostly filled with tornado threats (hopefully the worst has come and gone already in 2021), there’s also always a chance that a strong storm will cause evacuations along the coast and impact our area.

Unlike tornadoes, we usually have notice before a hurricane impacts us, so our biggest advice would be to keep an eye on the weather daily, just to know what’s going on.

Plus, a hurricane can quickly derail a much-needed family vacation to the beach, so it’s always important to check ahead.

We have a lot of respect for weather forecasters and know they know what they’re doing, but we hope they’re wrong in this instance. After a tough year, the last thing the Southeast needs is bad weather causing havoc.