The 2025 Atlantic hurricane season has finally
wrapped up and it ended with, well, a truly catastrophic
event, Hurricane Melissa. A historic storm, really.
A category five Titan that just tore through
the Caribbean. It slammed Jamaica, Cuba, Haiti,
leaving behind just widespread destruction. The
death toll is estimated close to 100 people.
And the intensity was just off the charts. Yeah.
Melissa peaked with sustained winds of 185 miles
per hour. That's a record breaking level of ferocity.
But here's the paradox of the season. And it's
a huge one. Despite the brutal power of Melissa
and two other cat fives this year, the continental
US coast saw, well, nothing, an unprecedented
escape. A massive statistical contradiction,
and that's what we need to unpack today. Absolutely.
Welcome to Meteorology Matters, the podcast that
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of Meteorology Matters. purely statistical point
of view, it seems almost moderate. Right. On
the surface. We ended up with 13 named storms,
five hurricanes, and four major hurricanes. And
the climatological average, what we normally
see, is around 14, 7, and 3. So fewer named storms,
fewer hurricanes overall. Exactly. So if you
just look at the counts, you'd think, oh, a slightly
below average season. But that completely misses
the story of 2025, doesn't it? The research has
been calling this an all -or -nothing season,
and that feels right. The real story is in the
intensity. The intensity paradox, yeah. That's
the key. We only had five storms get strong enough
to be called a hurricane. But four of those five,
four out of five, that's 80 % escalated to major
hurricane status. So category three or higher.
And that 80 % ratio is the crucial number. It's
a huge statistical anomaly. Put that in context
for us. What's the normal ratio? Well, the long
-term average, what you'd expect to see, is that
about 40 % of hurricanes become majors. So this
season doubled that. It literally doubled the
historical average. And what that tells us is
that the atmospheric conditions were, well, they
were extremely picky. They either shut down storm
formation completely, Or they provided the absolute
perfect fuel for these explosive, incredibly
powerful systems. There was no middle ground.
We can actually measure that power difference,
right, using the accumulated cyclone energy,
or ACE. Right. ACE combines the intensity and
the duration of all the storms. So with fewer
hurricanes, you might think, OK, the ACE score
would be lower this year. And that would be a
very logical assumption. But it's wrong. So what
was the final number? Despite having fewer storms,
the total ACE for the season ended up around
133. It's actually about seven or eight percent
above the long -term average. So quality over
quantity, basically. The storms that did manage
to survive were way more potent and they lasted
longer than usual. Precisely. And some of those
storms were carrying almost the entire season's
energy budget on their own. You're talking about
Hurricane Aaron? Absolutely. The disproportionate
intensity is perfectly illustrated by Aaron.
The accumulated cyclone energy that Aaron generated
all by itself. It was roughly equal to the combined
ACE of seven other named storms. Seven storms
combined. Which ones? Andrea, Barry, Chantal,
Dexter, Fernand, Gabrielle, and Imelda. All seven
of them together barely match the energy output
of Erin alone. Wow. So the season wasn't balanced
at all. It was just dominated by three or four
absolute monsters. That's the perfect way to
describe it. A few powerhouses just dominated
the whole atmospheric energy budget. Which brings
us to the weird timing of the season. It really
felt disjointed with these long lulls and then
these sudden violent bursts of activity. That
stop -start nature was. Yeah. It was bewildering,
even for us watching it unfold. First, the season
started late. Andre, yeah. It didn't form until
late June. June 24th. That's the latest start
we've seen since 2014. And it's well past the
median date of June 15th. But then, after a burst
of activity, we hit this this massive quiet period,
a real dormancy. And that quiet spell from late
August through mid -September, that's supposed
to be the absolute peak of the season. For almost
three weeks, the Atlantic just went completely
silent. It felt dead. That lull, it ran from
August 29th through September 16th, and it became
a huge puzzle for researchers. When you see a
quiet period that profound and that long right
during the climatological peak, You know, it's
not just random. It points to some massive planetary
skill dynamics at play. So what were they? What
were the scientific mechanisms that basically
just flipped the off switch on the Atlantic?
The research points to two main culprits. The
first is something we see pretty often, which
is huge plumes of Saharan dust drifting out over
the ocean. The Saharan air layer, SAL, it brings
dry, stable air. Right, and that's just hostile
for hurricane formation. But the bigger factor,
the more dominant one this season, was the Madden
-Julian Oscillation, or MJO. Okay, for listeners
who might not be familiar, can you break down
the MJO and why it's so critical? Sure. The MJO
is this massive wave of pressure and moisture.
It travels eastward around the entire globe,
right near the equator, and it completes a full
circle every 30 to 60 days. And it has two different
modes, right? It has two main phases. The active
phase is characterized by rising air, deep clouds,
low pressure. basically all the ingredients that
help hurricanes form and grow. And the other
one? The other is the quiescent or suppressed
phase, which is the exact opposite. You get sinking
air, clear skies, and much more stable atmosphere.
So if the MJO is active over the Atlantic, it's
like a green light for storms. If it's suppressed,
it's a red light. Precisely. And during that
critical lull in late August and early September,
analysis confirmed the MJO was firmly in its
suppressed phase over the entire Western Atlantic
and the Caribbean. That sinking air was warming
and drying out the mid -levels of the atmosphere.
It was essentially starving any little disturbances
of the moisture and lift they needed to get organized.
The Atlantic was just uninhabitable for storms
during that window. Okay, so let's shift to the
US side of the story. We have this explosive,
scientifically fascinating, but very start and
stop season out in the Atlantic. But the headline
that really got everyone's attention was the
incredible U .S. escape. It's a truly remarkable
data point. 2025 was the first time in 10 years
since 2015 that no hurricane made landfall on
the continental U .S. And you have to think of
the context of recent years. We just broke a
record long streak of five straight years from
2020 to 2024, where we had at least one major
hurricane landfall every single year. We were
getting used to names like Irma, Ian, Harvey,
Helene. These catastrophic landfalls felt like
the new normal. The feeling going into 2025 was
that the US was due for another big hit. The
atmosphere, as you said, had other plans. None
of the five hurricanes this year even got close
enough to trigger major evacuation orders. So
what was it? What were the specific persistent
atmospheric patterns that created this protective
shield around the country? It was an incredible
combination of steering currents. We saw two
main sustained features that just worked together
perfectly to keep these powerful storms safely
out at sea. The first factor was something we
call persistent troughiness. Okay, that's a term
you hear meteorologists use, but can you break
down what troughiness means and why its persistence
was so unusual this year? Of course. A trough
is basically an elongated area of low atmospheric
pressure. You can think of it as a sustained
southward dip in the jet stream over a specific
region. This season we had one of these troughs
just stubbornly parked over the southeast United
States. And because storms tend to flow around
these pressure systems. Exactly. Low pressure
systems spin counterclockwise in the northern
hemisphere, so this persistent trough created
a reliable counterclockwise steering current.
Meaning any storm that approached the east coast
from the south or east would just hit those winds
and get shunted away? Precisely. It acted like
a giant continuous defensive wall. It diverted
all the incoming storms northward and then eastward,
pushing them out into the open Atlantic long
before they had a chance to even threaten the
coast. And the other piece of the puzzle was
the Bermuda High. The Bermuda High, or the North
Atlantic Subtropical High, was the second critical
component. It's this huge semi -permanent high
pressure system, and its position really dictates
where storms go. If it builds west, it pushes
them right into the Gulf of Mexico or the East
Coast. Right. But this season, that high was
consistently positioned farther east than usual.
And how did that change the steering? Because
the center of the high was displaced so far to
the east, the clockwise flow on its western edge,
the flow that would normally steer storms inland,
was much weaker and shifted offshore. This gave
the storms enough room to make that graceful
curve away from both the East Coast and the Gulf
of Mexico. The persistence of that favorable
pattern was just a huge piece of atmospheric
good fortune for the U .S. It's so important
to point out though that even though the U .S.
escaped a hurricane landfall, It wasn't completely
untouched. That's a crucial distinction to make.
We did have one named Storm Make Landfall. Tropical
Storm Chantal. Right. Chantal came ashore in
South Carolina on July 6th with winds around
50 miles per hour. It wasn't a powerful system
by any means, but it was a slow mover. It caused
a lot of inland flooding, contributed to three
deaths, and ended up causing about half a billion
dollars in damages as it moved into North Carolina.
But the really devastating coastal damage this
year didn't come from a direct hit. It came from
the raw power of those distant category fives
churning up the ocean. That's right. Even from
thousands of miles away, hurricanes Aaron, Humberto
and Imelda generated these immense long period
swells that pounded the U .S. East Coast for
weeks. And that sustained wave action has been
incredibly destructive, especially on the fragile
barrier islands like the Outer Banks in North
Carolina. We're seeing houses collapsing now
from surf that was generated months ago. The
research on this is dramatic. The erosion and
the constant battering from the waves has been
relentless. Since September 16th alone, those
swells from the three distant titans have triggered
the collapse of 16 beachfront homes along the
outer banks. 16. And on one single day, September
30th, five houses were lost at the same time,
all driven by the energy from waves created by
Emelda and Humberto. It's a costly reminder that
you don't need a landfall to get catastrophic
damage when the ocean is energized by these hiker
intense storms far out at sea. And that brings
us right to the heart of the 2025 season, that
sheer intensity. The fact that the Atlantic produced
three separate category five hurricanes, Aaron,
Humberto and Melissa, is an extreme event in
itself. It's genuinely rare. Historically speaking,
only about three percent of all Atlantic tropical
cyclones ever reach category five strength. This
season now joins the infamous 2005 season as
the only years on record to have three or more
cat fives 2005 had Emily Katrina Rita and Wilma
That was a season for the history books. It set
an incredibly high bar for intensity and 2025
came very, very close to matching it. Let's start
with Aaron. The speed at which it strengthened
was just alarming. It's a perfect example of
this rapid intensification trend we keep seeing.
Aaron's intensification wasn't just rapid. It
was classified as extreme rapid intensification.
It became the earliest cat five ever recorded
outside of the Gulf of Mexico in the Caribbean.
And the speed was historic. In just 24 hours,
its winds exploded from 75 miles per hour. to
160 miles per hour. Oh, an 85 mile per hour increase
in one day. That jump is tied for the fifth fastest
24 hour wind increase we have on record. And
with winds that are strengthening that fast,
the central pressure has to be just plummeting.
Oh, absolutely. Aaron's central pressure dropped
83 millibars in that same 24 hour window. It
went from 998 down to 915. That kind of pressure
drop is tied for the third fastest ever recorded
in the Atlantic. It's a sign of a truly explosive
process happening inside the storm's core. And
then things got even stranger. We had two of
these intense storms, Humberto and Imelda, get
locked in this bizarre atmospheric dance, the
Fujiwara effect. And that interaction actually
played a direct role in protecting the U .S.
The Fujiwara effect is fascinating. It's what
happens when two tropical cyclones get close
enough that they start to orbit a common center.
In this case, we had category five Humberto and
category two Imelda get within 465 miles of each
other. That sounds close. It's very close. The
interaction zone usually starts when they're
about 800, 900 miles apart. So at 465 miles,
their movements are completely dictated by each
other. And Humberto was the bigger, more powerful
storm, so it was in control. Right. Humberto
was the dominant partner in the dance. Before
they got that close, Imelda was on a track that
made a U .S. landfall, probably in the Carolinas,
look like a real possibility. But Humberto changed
that. Humberto essentially grabbed Imelda. Its
larger circulation started tugging on Imelda,
steering it in a counterclockwise loop around
its center, and that pulled Imelda out into the
open Atlantic, away from the coast. So in this
case, the Fujiwara effect acted as yet another
steering mechanism that helped the U .S. dodge
a bullet. It spared the U .S., but Imelda still
hit other places hard. It did. As it curved away,
the center of Imelda passed directly over Bermuda
as a Category 2, and its outer bands brought
devastating rain and flooding to the Dominican
Republic, where tragically four people were killed.
It just goes to show the storms that miss the
US still have immense destructive power. So let's
connect this all back to the broader climate
picture. This season was defined by extreme power
four out of five hurricanes becoming major. Does
this fit with the scientific research on long
term storm trends? If you look at the wider research,
the answer is an unequivocal yes. For the last
20 years, studies have consistently shown the
same thing. While the global number of tropocylones
isn't really increasing, the critical finding
is that the fraction of those storms that reach
the most destructive category four or five status
is absolutely increasing, and it's projected
to keep doing so. So the focus is shifting. It's
less about preparing for more frequent storms
and more about preparing for... less frequent,
but overwhelmingly powerful events. Exactly.
The risk is becoming more and more concentrated
in those high -end categories. And this is directly
tied to that phenomenon of rapid intensification.
The numbers on that are staggering. They are.
Just look at the data. Since 2003, We have seen
a six -fold increase in what we call extreme
rapid intensification events. We've had 18 of
those events since 2003, compared to only three
in the entire period from 1980 to 2002. Wow,
a six -fold increase. It's a profound shift,
and it suggests that the thermodynamic environment
of the Atlantic is just becoming more and more
favorable for these explosive processes to occur.
And that terrifying physics brings us back to
Hurricane Melissa. the third Cat 5, and the most
devastating storm of the year anywhere in the
world. What were the specific conditions that
allowed Melissa to become so incredibly powerful?
Melissa was born into a hyper -fueled environment.
Research confirmed that over 80 % of the entire
Atlantic basin had above -average ocean heat
content this season. 80 %? And that ranked as
the third highest ocean heat content we have
on record, going all the way back to 1958. But
crucially, This warmth wasn't just a thin layer
on the surface. The heat extended deep down into
the ocean. And why is that depth so critical
for a storm to intensify? It all comes down to
a process called upwelling. A powerful hurricane's
winds are so strong they churn up the ocean surface.
If the warm water layer is shallow, that churning
will pull up cooler water from the depths. And
that cooler water acts like a brake, weakening
the storm. It's a natural self -breaking mechanism.
But Melissa found a way to avoid that. The key
was its location and the fact that it stalled.
It underwent this explosive intensification and
then it became nearly stationary for three full
days to South of Jamaica. It was drifting at
less than four miles per hour. A walking case.
And this stall happened over an area where that
deep warm water layer was incredibly thick. So
even with the immense churning power of a category
five, Melissa couldn't pull up any cool water.
It was just parked over a virtually endless supply
of high octane fuel, which allowed it to maintain
that extreme intensity. And that's how it peaked
at 185 mile per hour winds and a central pressure
of 892 millibars. Those numbers put Melissa in
the absolute top tier of Atlantic hurricanes.
It's tied for the second strongest ever by wind
speed and the third strongest by pressure in
the entire history of the basin. We're talking
about the maximum possible ferocity for a storm
on this planet. And that power led to a tragic
historic landfall in Jamaica on October 28th.
It made landfall in southwest Jamaica as a category
five, and the preliminary data shows it's tied
with the infamous 1935 Labor Day hurricane as
the strongest landfalling Atlantic hurricane
on record. Strongest ever. By both wind and pressure.
The impact was immediate and catastrophic, and
it continued as the storm moved over Cuba, Haiti,
and the Bahamas. One of the most incredible scientific
takeaways from Melissa came from a storm chaser.
There was hyperlocal data collected by someone
on the ground in Crawford, Jamaica, just five
nautical miles from the center. That ground level
data is absolutely invaluable. It helps us calibrate
what we're seeing from satellites and planes.
This chaser was deep inside the radius of maximum
winds in the inner right front quadrant of the
eyewall. That is the most dangerous place to
be in a hurricane. What did the pressure readings
show from that location? The chaser recorded
a minimum sea level pressure of 926 millibars.
Now remember, the storm central pressure was
estimated to be 892 millibars. So that's a 34
millibar drop over just five miles. An absolutely
staggering pressure gradient. The sheer force
created by a gradient that steep is what drives
those explosive wind speeds. And the physical
descriptions. They sound like something out of
science fiction. They noted 100 % whiteout conditions.
Zero visibility from the rain and spray. And
they described a continuous screaming sound.
The physical toll was intense. The explosive
wind gusts created actual pain in their eardrums.
Did they get into the eye itself? They experienced
the southeastern edge of it. After the pressure
bottomed out, there was a sudden lull that lasted
about 45 minutes. But what's really fascinating
is that the pressure data during that core passage
showed these highly volatile spikes and dips.
And what does that tell us? Researchers believe
those are the distinct fingerprints of inner
eye wall mesovortices. Okay, can you explain
what those are? Mistal vortices are essentially
small, intense mini tornadoes that spin up within
the main eye wall of a very powerful hurricane.
They create these sudden violent increases in
wind and localized drops in pressure, which is
what causes those wild spikes in the data. They
represent a huge jump in localized damage potential.
Beyond the ground data, Melissa also set some
new global records with our advanced technology.
It really was a scientific crucible. A drop sonde
An instrument dropped from a Hurricane Hunter
plane measured a wind gust of 252 miles per hour.
That is the highest wind gust ever measured globally
by a drop sought. That single data point will
change how we design buildings for extreme wind.
And the lightning data was even more unbelievable.
It was revolutionary. As Melissa was making landfall.
Satellites recorded a peak flash rate of 700
lightning strikes per minute inside the core.
700 per minute. That's nearly 12 lightning strikes
every single second. It completely rewrites our
understanding of how much lightning is possible
inside a hurricane. That terrifying science,
of course, translated into unimaginable destruction.
Let's pivot now from the physics to the catastrophic
costs. The storm chaser on the ground who had
personally been through 84 hurricanes said Melissa's
winds were the most extreme they had ever witnessed.
The damage was classified as catastrophic. What
did that look like? The landscape analysis showed
100 % defoliation of trees. Everything was stripped
bare, leaving this wintry, dead, even burnt looking
landscape behind. And buildings? Total failure.
Wood frame houses were just flattened, gone.
And critically, even concrete buildings, which
are supposed to be hurricane resistant, suffered
partial collapse or major roof failure. The research
suggests that while the walls were concrete,
the rebar reinforcement just wasn't enough to
handle the pressure from 185 mile per hour winds.
The economic cost for Jamaica is a number that's
hard to even comprehend. It's a generational
catastrophe. The World Bank estimates Melissa
will cost Jamaica 8 .8 billion dollars. And put
that in perspective, that is 41 percent of Jamaica's
entire annual GDP. Almost half their economy
wiped out by one storm. Few countries on Earth
could withstand a blow like that. And while Haiti
and Cuba also suffered major damage relative
to their economies, Jamaica's hit was just brutal.
And if we zoom out, these extreme weather events
are fueling a growing global refugee crisis.
The link between climate disruption and human
displacement is just stark. Research from the
UN High Commissioner for Refugees shows that
over the last decade, climate -related disasters
have displaced 250 million people. 250 million?
That's 70 ,000 people a day, or two people forced
to flee their homes every three seconds. And
the people most at risk are those who are already
vulnerable. Absolutely. The research shows that
three out of every four refugees who are already
displaced because of conflict are now living
in countries that are highly exposed to these
climate risks. It creates this heartbreaking
cycle where people who have already fled violence
are at an incredibly high risk of being forced
to flee all over again by a storm like Melissa.
But against that backdrop of catastrophic failure
in Jamaica, we saw this really powerful example
of local resilience, specifically with energy.
This was a critical bright spot. Most of Jamaica's
centralized power grid relies on imported oil
and gas, which is very vulnerable in a storm.
But after Melissa hit, we saw that rooftop solar
panels paired with batteries kept essential services
running for many people, in stark contrast to
the total failure of the main grid. This is more
than just a nice story. It represents a new model
for energy security in these vulnerable regions.
It really is the model for the future. We learned
this lesson from Puerto Rico after Hurricane
Maria in 2017. It took six months to restore
power to most of the island. Now, labs like Oak
Ridge National Lab are pioneering the use of
microgrids, small local power grids with solar
and battery storage that are designed to operate
independently when the main grid goes down. So
you shift the focus from repairing massive transmission
lines to just keeping a neighborhood online.
And the benefit is immediate. As one energy expert
said, if I have rooftop solar and batteries,
and if I can keep my refrigerator running, my
entire neighborhood benefits. It's about maintaining
those essential local services. That's true resilience.
Shifting gears to the technology that helps us
track these storms. We have to talk about the
work of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration's hurricane hunters. Those P3
Orion crews are mission critical. They fly directly
into the core of these storms to deploy the drop
sawns and drones that give us the data we need
for watches and warnings. They were in Aaron,
Imelda, and Melissa this year. And there was
a bigger reliance on drone technology this year,
wasn't there? There was. They deployed 18 of
these specialized black swift drones right into
the cores of the storms. And they tested a critical
new science strategy during Gabriel and Imelda.
What was the goal with that new strategy? The
goal was to fly a drone just above the ocean
surface, right near a wave buoy. The data from
that lowest layer of the atmosphere is incredibly
hard to get, but it's vital. Scientists need
it to better understand how energy, the heat
and moisture is exchanged between the warm ocean
and the storm. That friction layer is the engine
room of a hurricane. The better we understand
it, the better our intensity forecast will get.
And speaking of forecasting, 2025 was a monumental
year for the industry. We saw the debut of a
new AI model that just blew away the conventional
systems. It's fascinating because the conventional
physics -based models really struggled with all
the rapid intensification events this year. But
the postseason analysis showed the remarkable
success of the new Google DeepMind AI model,
the GDMI. It wasn't just good. It was the leader
of the pack. It was unprecedented for a brand
new model. The GDMI outperformed all the conventional
models. For track forecasting, predicting where
the storm will go, it either beat or tied the
official National Hurricane Center forecast at
every single lead time. And for intensity. It
was highly competitive there too, nearly on par
with the National Hurricane Center's best efforts.
So why is an AI model, which is just trained
on data, suddenly able to do better than models
built on decades of atmospheric physics? The
physics models are robust, but they struggle
with chaotic, non -linear events like rapid intensification.
The GDMI model is different. It's a data -driven
model. It was trained on decades of storm histories
and atmospheric data, and it learns to recognize
complex patterns that lead to certain outcomes.
That pattern recognition allowed it to anticipate
the explosive leap in intensity far better than
the traditional models could. So a new model
leading in both track and intensity, that's a
huge shift for the entire weather industry. It
signals a profound revolution. The fact that
a deep learning AI model could immediately outperform
models that have been refined for decades tells
you that artificial intelligence is about to
fundamentally change how we forecast these storms.
Let's bring it back home now to the institutional
side of things. This statistically miraculous
U .S. escape happened at a time when, according
to research, our own federal agencies were in
a state of operational weakness. And this raises
a critical question of preparedness versus just
sheer luck. Research indicates that both FEMA
and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration,
or NOAA, entered the 2025 season in weakened
states. This was mostly due to losing a lot of
experienced staff over the last few years. And
what does losing that experienced staff mean
for an agency like the National Weather Service,
which is part of NOAA? The impact is severe.
When veteran forecasters leave, they take years
of specialized, localized knowledge with them.
You can't replace that overnight. Managers were
trying to hire, but the federal process is slow
and new staff need months of training. It creates
gaps in institutional memory that can be dangerous
during a high -stress event. On top of the staffing
issues, there was also the very real threat of
a government shutdown right in the middle of
hurricane season. That shutdown risk was a huge
administrative headwind. Now the core forecasters
at the National Hurricane Center are considered
essential so they would keep working. though
without pay. The real disruption would hit the
response and mitigation efforts, especially at
FEMA. How would FEMA be compromised in a shutdown?
FEMA relies on a huge support staff for logistics,
processing aid, coordinating with states. And
those people are often the first to be furloughed.
So the forecasters could be issuing warnings,
but the administrative machine needed to actually
mobilize resources and help people would grind
to a halt. So the whole response infrastructure
was fragile. Exactly. The key takeaway from 2025
is that the U .S. was exceptionally statistically
fortunate not to be tested. We were spared a
major hurricane landfall at the exact moment
our critical agencies were battling these significant
internal struggles. The atmosphere gave us a
shield. As we look ahead to 2026, the forecast
is all about balancing two conflicting factors.
On one hand, we have the potential for an El
Nino event to develop. Which usually means a
quieter Atlantic season. Right. El Nino increases
wind shear. which tear storms apart. So that
would suggest a quieter season. But on the other
side of scale, you have the incredible statistical
anomaly we just witnessed. Precisely. It is highly,
highly unusual to go two consecutive years without
a U .S. hurricane landfall. It only happened
six times since 1851. So the odds are not in
our favor for a repeat. So the big question for
you to think about is this. In 2026, will the
large scale atmospheric patterns give us another
lucky break? Or will our institutional preparedness
be the only thing standing between us and the
statistical certainty of a major hurricane landfall?
You've been listening to Meteorology Matters,
created by meteorologist Rob Jones. Now that
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