Update for the 2025 Hurricane Forecast

Wiki: 

The University of Arizona (UA) forecasting team, Dr. Xubin Zeng and Kyle Davis, have updated their April 2025 predictions and still forecast an average to a little above average year. Their updates are as follows: 

Their June total predicted tropical activity is higher in ACE and named storms but the same in major hurricanes and hurricanes compared to their April prediction. 

March/April/May tropical sea surface temperatures are the most significant factor in the June model. Temperatures are much cooler than last year and 2023 but not as cool as 2022. 

ENSO forecasts show conditions are most likely to remain neutral during peak hurricane season. Thus, they did not include any ENSO adjustment in the model this year. 

They also looked at the zonal pseudo-wind stress in the North Atlantic. The values this year will provide a dampening effect on total activity. 

Their average error for hurricane outlooks since they first started issuing them in 2014 is 2.0 hurricanes. Since 2017, when they started issuing forecasts for ACE and major hurricanes, their average error has been 46.1 units and 0.8 major hurricanes. For named storms, for which they started issuing predictions in 2019, the average error has been 4.7.

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Reference: Kyle Davis, Xubin Zeng, and Elizabeth A. Ritchie, 2015: A New Statistical Model for Predicting Seasonal North Atlantic Hurricane Activity. Wea. Forecasting, 30, 730–741, doi: 10.1175/WAF-D-14-00156.1 

Davis, K. and X. Zeng, 2019: Seasonal Prediction of North Atlantic Accumulated Cyclone Energy and Major Hurricane Activity. Wea. Forecasting, 34, 221–232,https://doi.org/10.1175/WAF-D-18-0125.1 

Researcher contact: Mr. Kyle Davis (email: davis7000@gmail.com); Prof. Xubin Zeng (email: xubin@email.arizona.edu; Tel: 520-621-4782)

June 2025 Report in PDF Format: