This Atlantic hurricane season is about to do something that hasn’t happened in 175 years

今年大西洋飓风季即将发生 175 年来未曾有过的情况

Last week, the Atlantic hurricane season blew through its traditional peak—which comes around September 10—with nary a tropical wave in sight, let alone a storm or hurricane. This is remarkable. Usually this is the time of year when sea surface temperatures reach their warmest in the tropics, and with a favorable atmosphere it should be smooth skating for tropical systems. But this year, the main region where most tropical systems develop is choked with Saharan dust and wind shear.

上周，大西洋飓风季度过了其传统的活跃高峰期（通常在 9 月 10 日左右），但海面上连一个热带波动都看不到，更不用说风暴或飓风了。这非常引人注目。通常，每年的这个时候，热带地区的海面温度达到最高，在大气条件适宜的情况下，热带气旋本应顺畅发展。但今年，大多数热带气旋的主要发展区域被撒哈拉沙尘和风切变所阻碍。

No one is complaining. Landfalling hurricanes are incredibly destructive for coastal areas and have the potential for considerable inland rainfall. Even storms at sea, in the Gulf of Mexico, can send energy prices skyrocketing—the last thing needed this year.

没有人对此抱怨。登陆的飓风对沿海地区具有极大的破坏性，并可能带来严重的内陆降雨。即使是发生在墨西哥湾海上的风暴，也可能导致能源价格飙升——而这正是今年最不希望看到的情况。

Nevertheless, the quietude is historic. Beginning in 1944, the United States began monitoring the Atlantic basin, which includes the Gulf, Caribbean Sea, and northern Atlantic Ocean, with aircraft to detect hurricanes. Dating back to 1944, a hurricane had formed every year by September 11. The latest “first” Atlantic hurricanes came in 2002, with Gustav, and in 2013, with Humberto on this date.

尽管如此，这种平静是史无前例的。从 1944 年开始，美国开始利用飞机监测包括墨西哥湾、加勒比海和北大西洋在内的大西洋盆地，以探测飓风。自 1944 年以来，每年到 9 月 11 日之前都会形成飓风。大西洋“首个”飓风出现最晚的纪录是在 2002 年（飓风“古斯塔夫”）和 2013 年（飓风“温贝托”），均发生在这一天。

Atlantic hurricane records officially go back to 1851, although older records are less reliable because observations of storms developing at sea were reliant on reports from shipping vessels. So some storms were missed. If we extend the hurricane record all the way back to 1851, every year still records at least one Atlantic hurricane. But in 1941, the first hurricane did not form until September 17. This is the date of the latest first Atlantic hurricane on record.

大西洋飓风的官方记录始于 1851 年，尽管早期的记录可靠性较低，因为当时对海上风暴的观测依赖于船只的报告，因此可能会漏掉一些风暴。如果我们将飓风记录追溯到 1851 年，每年仍至少记录到一次大西洋飓风。但在 1941 年，首个飓风直到 9 月 17 日才形成。这是有记录以来大西洋首个飓风形成最晚的日期。

I’m here to tell you that the Atlantic will not produce a hurricane by the end of Thursday. The National Hurricane Center is presently monitoring a single disturbance in the Atlantic, but it gives this system a “near zero” percent chance of becoming a tropical depression or storm during the next two days. The likelihood of it ever becoming a hurricane is low.

我可以告诉大家，大西洋在周四结束前不会产生飓风。美国国家飓风中心目前正在监测大西洋上的一个扰动，但该中心认为该系统在未来两天内发展成为热带低压或风暴的概率“接近于零”。它最终演变成飓风的可能性也很低。

The Atlantic season still has some runway left—it often produces hurricanes in October and officially runs to the end of November—so it remains too early to predict the possibility of an Atlantic season without a hurricane. But the odds are rising, and that would be historic. By other measures, this season is also extraordinarily quiet. A common metric used to gauge overall activity during a season is “accumulated cyclone energy.” For data back to 1950, this year’s accumulated cyclone energy ranks 77th out of 77 years, with a value of just 7 percent of normal levels racked up by five relatively weak tropical storms.

大西洋飓风季还有一段时间——它经常在 10 月产生飓风，官方季节持续到 11 月底——因此现在预测大西洋飓风季可能“零飓风”还为时过早。但这种可能性正在上升，如果发生，那将是史无前例的。从其他指标来看，这个季节也异常平静。衡量季节整体活跃度的一个常用指标是“累积气旋能量”（ACE）。根据 1950 年以来的数据，今年累积气旋能量在 77 年中排名第 77 位，仅为正常水平的 7%，且是由五个相对较弱的热带风暴累积而成的。

So what’s going on out there? The short answer is that a strengthening El Niño in the Pacific Ocean has put the kibosh on the main development region of the Atlantic this year. The El Niño anomaly this summer, nearly 3° C above baseline in the Pacific, is stronger than any observed at this time of year in the modern record. This generally produces hostile wind shear levels over the Atlantic, and that has been measured this year.

那么，外面到底发生了什么？简短的回答是，太平洋地区不断增强的厄尔尼诺现象抑制了今年大西洋的主要发展区域。今年夏天太平洋地区的厄尔尼诺异常现象比基准线高出近 3°C，是现代记录中每年此时观测到的最强的一次。这通常会在大西洋上空产生不利的风切变，而今年也确实监测到了这一点。

This clearly is having some benefit in the tropical Atlantic, in the form of fewer tropical systems this year. But on balance, El Niño will probably be far more disruptive than beneficial when it peaks this fall and winter, with diminished rains already impacting travel through the Panama Canal and possibly leading to poor rice harvests in Asia and famine elsewhere.

这显然给热带大西洋带来了一些好处，即今年热带气旋系统较少。但总的来说，当厄尔尼诺现象在今年秋冬达到顶峰时，其破坏性可能远大于益处。降雨量的减少已经影响了巴拿马运河的航运，并可能导致亚洲水稻歉收以及其他地区的饥荒。

And then there is El Niño’s impact on global temperatures, which often lags the phenomenon by several months. This would set up peak heating next summer. Almost assuredly, 2027 will be the planet’s hottest year on record, and summer in the Northern Hemisphere is likely to be brutal for large chunks of the planet.

此外，厄尔尼诺现象对全球气温的影响通常会滞后几个月。这将导致明年夏天出现高温峰值。几乎可以肯定，2027 年将成为地球有记录以来最热的一年，北半球的夏天对地球上的大部分地区来说都可能是残酷的。