Despite there being only a week left in the 2023 hurricane season, the National Hurricane Center continues to track several features across the Atlantic and Pacific that have chances of further development.
Water temperatures remain plenty warm for tropical cyclones to form if they are able to find an area of reduced upper-level winds, which are common this time of year.
Climatologically speaking, both basins have already passed their typical end date for activity, meaning any system that does form would be a rarity.
In the eastern Pacific, Tropical Depression Twenty-E developed on Thursday about 1,000 miles off the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja California.
The NHC expects the cyclone to continue to struggle over the next week, but there is a chance it could briefly strengthen into Tropical Storm Ramon.
If sustained winds reach at least 39 mph, the cyclone would become the seventeenth named storm of the season.
Fortunately, due to hostile upper-level winds and cooler water temperatures, the cyclone is expected to remain harmlessly out at sea.
Besides the tropical depression, no other areas of disturbed weather are being tracked in the eastern Pacific.
The basin has been more active than normal, which is typical during an El Niño year. So far, 16 named storms have formed, and ten have gone on to becoming hurricanes.
Major hurricanes have included Calvin, Dora, Fernanda, Hilary, Jova, Lidia, Norma and Otis and have led to at least $15 billion in damage.
In the Atlantic, frontal boundaries continue to exit North America, which provide a chance of tropical or even subtropical activity.
The FOX Forecast Center is monitoring an area of low pressure associated with one of those frontal boundaries, about halfway between Bermuda and Africa.
The NHC has given the area of disturbed weather only a medium chance of development over the next week.
If a named storm would form, it would be known as Vince – the twenty-first system to reach at least tropical cyclone status in 2023.
An average season usually only produces 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three cyclones that reach major hurricane status.
