Why Doesn’t Washington Get Hit By Hurricanes? A meteorologist gave some answers

A Colorado State University meteorologist recently told the weather channel that we should expect a busy hurricane season this year. Experts believe that 25 hurricanes should roam the Atlantic in 2024.

The southeastern portion of the US is the target of many powerful hurricanes. The New York Tri-state area and the New England coastal states are known to get their share of hurricanes. But why don’t we ever see a hurricane march up the Pacific coast to visit the Pacific Northwest?

Why don't hurricanes or cyclones visit America's Pacific Coast?

The short answer: Hurricanes need warm water to grow and thrive.

A meteorologist from the National Weather Service explained to the Tacoma News Tribune that the Pacific Northwest doesn’t get hurricanes - because waters along the West Coast are typically a chilly 50 to 65 degrees. 

When was the last time a hurricane roamed in the North Pacific?

It's been nearly 50 years since we’ve last had a hurricane venture into the North Pacific. 

‘In 1975, a nameless hurricane formed from the remnants of Hurricane Ilsa northeast of Hawaii. The storm became the farthest-ever North Pacific hurricane and came close to the coast of Alaska, but it failed to make landfall after colliding with a cold front and falling apart.’ -Tacoma News Tribune

 

Why does the West Coast have such colder water? 

Cold water in the Pacific is felt off the coast of Alaska, British Columbia, Washington, and Oregon. Surprisingly - the cold water is felt down along the entire California Coast into the southern tip of Mexico’s Baja Peninsula.

Want to experience a beach with warm bath water?

You’ll want to book a trip to Mexico’s Caribbean coastal towns of Cancun, Playa Del Carmen, or Tulum.

Don’t get us wrong - Cabo San Lucas at the tip of Mexico’s Baja California peninsula is nice compared to Washington’s Ocean Shores or Oregon’s Cannon Beach. But Cabo has comparatively colder waters flowing into their beaches due to the North Pacific Gyre.

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What is the North Pacific Gyre?

It’s a large rotating weather system with interior rotating systems within it. 

‘We simply don’t have (the warmer water in the Pacific,) our ocean current is much too cold, generally coming down from the Gulf of Alaska.’ -Mary Butwin, from the National Weather Service via the Tacoma News Tribune.

In the graphic below, you’ll notice that the North Pacific Gyre is a larger system that circulates water in a counterclockwise rotation from North America’s Pacific coastline - back toward Asia, where it mixes in with tropical warmer waters  - creating typhoons on the east coast of Asia. (GRAPHIC CREDIT: El Niño wave interactions - Scientific Figure - from Researchgate.net)

Mean surface gyres circulation in the Pa- cific. The currents are mainly induced by wind stress, which follows the latitudinal variability of surface winds, and constrained by lateral boundaries, i.e. coasts.

The same effect happens in the Atlantic Ocean

This same phenomenon takes place in the Atlantic - where the North Atlantic Gyre pulls water from northern Europe toward the African coast before pushing it west toward the Americas.

This is why the UK (like us here in the Pacific Northwest) rarely sees a hurricane. The United Kingdom experienced a rare hurricane in 2011 - Hurricane Bawbag, also known as Cyclone Friedhelm struck in December of 2011.

25 costliest hurricanes of all time

Although the full extent of damage caused by Hurricane Ian in the Southwest is still being realized, Ian is already being called one of the costliest storms to ever hit the U.S. Stacker took a look at NOAA data to extrapolate the costliest U.S. hurricanes of all time.  

LIST: 10 Deadliest Louisiana Hurricanes

Gallery Credit: Rob Kirkpatrick

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