Renowned hurricane soothsayer Dr. William Gray and his team atColorado State University have scaled back their forecast for thehurricane season but still expect the season to be more active thanaverage. Seven rather than eight hurricanes are expected now andonly three of them are expected to be intense rather than the fourexpected in the group’s prior forecast on June 7. In round numbers,the August forecast is for three named storms, two hurricanes, andone intense or major hurricane.

“Information obtained through July 2000 indicates that theAtlantic hurricane season in 2000 is likely to be less active thanthe four recent very busy years of 1995, 1996, 1998 and 1999.However, total activity is expected to exceed the long term averageand is anticipated to be considerably more active than the mean forthe recent period of 1970 through 1994.

“We estimate that the 2000 season will have seven hurricanes(average is 5.7), 11 named storms (average is 9.3), 55 named stormdays (average is 47), 30 hurricane days (average is 24), threeintense (category 3-4-5) hurricanes (average is 2.2), six intensehurricane days (average is 4.7) and a Hurricane DestructionPotential (HDP) of 90 (average is 71). Collectively, net tropicalcyclone activity in year 2000 is expected to be about 130% of thelong term average.

The early August forecast update is in close to Gray’s Dec. 8,1999) and April 7 forecasts, but somewhat lower than his recentJune 7 update. “The forecast has been lowered slightly [because]June-July global circulation conditions have not progressed quiteas favorably for hurricane enhancement than as we anticipated inour early June forecast,” Gray said.

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