Predicting a whole season's worth of weather months in advance is a risky business. But that hasn't stopped Accuweather's veteran meteorologist and expert long-range forecaster, Joe Bastardi, from releasing his prediction for the upcoming hurricane season — and he's expecting a heavy one, Accuweather reports (" 2010 Hurricane Season Will Be More Active, Joe Bastardi Predicts”). Bastardi points to a handful of big-picture factors he says will make this summer's conditions more conducive to hurricane formation, and to U.S. landfall. Included in the tally: a weakening El Nino in the Pacific, warm temperatures in the Atlantic, weakening trade winds over Africa, and high humidity levels. A typical season brings about 11 named storms to the Atlantic, of which two or three strike the U.S. Last year's slow season saw only 9 named storms, and only one real landfall. But Bastardi's crystal ball sees 16 to 18 tropical storms, and 7 U.S. landfalls. For whatever it's worth, Bastardi was on the right track last year with his prediction of a slower-than-average season, seen here in this YouTube flashback (" Joe Bastardi Early 2009 Hurricane Forecast") — although in the event, the actual hurricane season was even weaker than he had predicted. So his prediction this year, based on what he sees as changed conditions, could be worth paying attention to. But his advice isn't helpful if you're looking for safe places: past years that resemble this year's conditions, Bastardi says, saw hurricanes equally likely to strike the Eastern Seaboard as to strike the Gulf Coast. "The years that I've looked at center it on Florida," he says, "but it's an equal spray up the Eastern Seaboard and through the Gulf of Mexico."
