Like so many other aspects of 2020, the Atlantic hurricane season hurled one shocking event after another, pushing the limits of what meteorologists thought was possible. Even as longtime records were falling and meteorologists felt as though they’d seen it all, 2020 had more tricks up its sleeve.
From the total number of storms to the rapid intensification and multiple landfalls, the records set in 2020 will likely stand for quite some time. What follows is a recap of the season’s most astonishing milestones with an explanation of the factors that led to the events in this unprecedented season. Some of those factors are natural occurrences, while some are the result of human impact on the climate.
So far, the 2020 Atlantic hurricane season has spawned 30 tropical storms, forcing forecasters to dig deep into the Greek alphabet for names, having run out of the assigned names in the middle of September. This breaks the former record set in 2005 of 28 named storms. A typical season only produces 12 named storms, so 2020 has already seen two and a half times more than average.