“Above average” 2023 Atlantic hurricane season corroborates CSU’s forecasts: Triple-I

Looking back at Colorado State University’s (CSU) July and August 2023 Atlantic hurricane season forecasts which called for “above average” activity, according to the Insurance Information Institute (Triple-I), this proved to be accurate as the season was above-normal, based on data from the National Hurricane Center.

Twenty named storms formed in 2023, with seven going on to become hurricanes, and three went on to reach major hurricane strength.

It is important to remember, that the average Atlantic hurricane season has 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes.

Three named storms, including one hurricane, made landfall in the continental United States this season, with Hurricane Idalia striking the Big Bend region of Florida as a Category 3 major hurricane on August 30.

Back in September, Moody’s RMS revealed that the total private market insured losses from Hurricane Idalia are estimated to be between $3bn and $5bn, with a best estimate of $3.5bn.

In addition, two tropical storms also made US landfalls in 2023: Harold (Padre Island, Texas) which struck on August 22, and Ophelia (Emerald Isle, North Carolina) which struck on September 23.

“The record warm Atlantic, combined with a moderate/strong El Niño, led to an extremely challenging forecast setup this year, but CSU’s forecasts generally performed well despite these challenges,” said Triple-I non-resident scholar Phil Klotzbach, Ph.D., a senior research scientist in the Department of Atmospheric Science at CSU and lead author of the institution’s Tropical Meteorology Project forecasts.

Adding: “Named storms and named storm days were well above their long-term averages, while Accumulated Cyclone Energy (an integrated metric accounting for intensity and duration of storms) was somewhat above normal.”

Sean Kevelighan, CEO, Triple-I, added: “As the nation’s financial first responders, insurers helped their customers recover economically from the impacts of another damaging hurricane season in 2023. Widespread damage incurred in Florida, Georgia and the Carolinas from Hurricane Idalia, in addition to other named storms that impacted areas of Texas, the Mid-Atlantic and New England, highlighted the importance of being financially protected from catastrophic losses and that includes having adequate levels of property insurance and flood coverage,”

Another notable observations from CSU about the 2023 Atlantic hurricane season was that 20 named storms that formed in the Atlantic this season tied with 1933 for the fourth most on record, only trailing 2020 (30 named storms), 2005 (28) and 2021 (21).

Lastly, 13 named storms also formed in the Atlantic between August, 20 – September, 28, the most on record during that timeframe, breaking the old record of 12 named storm formations set in 2020.

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