An early look at the 2023 hurricane season

The 2023 Atlantic hurricane season doesn't begin until June 1, but we're already getting some early indications of what to expect. The first hurricane forecasts of the year are coming out. 
In our hurricane season preview, the meteorologists discuss the factors that will impact the number of storms that form this year, including El Nino, La Nina, Saharan dust, and water temperatures.
Wonder what names the storms will be given? The team reveals those as well, plus what happens when the initial list of 21 names gets exhausted. They also discuss how to better warn people as the storms approach the coast and share their most memorable hurricane stories. 
Related episodes

In the sky with a hurricane hunter: Part 1
In the sky with a hurricane hunter: Part 2
Hear from the man who's been on 70-plus hurricane hunting flights
Uncovering the mysteries of ancient hurricanes
Hurricane Sandy: Looking back at the superstorm 10 years later
What went right and wrong with Hurricane Ian: forecasts and communication

About the Across the Sky podcast
The weekly weather podcast is hosted on a rotation by the Lee Weather team:
Matt Holiner of Lee Enterprises' Midwest group in Chicago, Kirsten Lang of the Tulsa World in Oklahoma, Joe Martucci of the Press of Atlantic City, N.J., and Sean Sublette of the Richmond Times-Dispatch in Virginia.
Episode transcript
Note: The following transcript was created by Adobe Premiere and may contain misspellings and other inaccuracies as it was generated automatically:
Hello, everyone, and welcome to another episode of Across the Sky, our Lee Enterprises Weather podcast. I'm Matt Holliner, covering weather for all of Lee's Midwest websites, apps and social media accounts. And I'm joined by my fellow meteorologist Joe Martucci with a press of Atlantic City in Atlantic City, New Jersey, and Sean Sublette with the Richmond Times-Dispatch in Richmond, Virginia.
And for this episode, guess it's just April. Hurricane season does not begin until June 1st, but we're starting to get some indications, some early signs of what we might expect this hurricane season of course, we've got to get through severe weather season first, but we know there's lots of interest once we get to this time of year and we start to get warmer temperatures, even in the Midwest where I am, my goodness, 80 degree weather.
But then you start thinking, wait a minute, with warmer weather, so comes warmer sea surface temperatures and you start looking to the Atlantic. And when we get an early season surprise this year and then what about the peak of Atlantic hurricane season? So we're going to start to share some of our thoughts. What's going to help this season, what's going to hinder it, and what are we ultimately going to get?
So, guys, what are some of your initial thoughts as we look ahead to hurricane season? Of course, with you guys being closer to the coast, the impacts a little bit higher as well. Yeah, I mean, you know, we are the press of Atlantic City. Atlantic City is smack dab on the Jersey Shore here. Many of us, you know, very, very cognizant of Superstorm Sandy, which I just can't believe.
But it was 11 years ago here, you know, looking at the Colorado State University forecast, they're kind of like the gold standard, along with the National Hurricane Center for these forecasts fairly average for this compared to climatology. So, you know, 13 named storms averages 14.46 hurricanes. The average is 7.2 major hurricanes. That's category three. Four or five hurricanes is a to average is three.
I think we can certainly take, you know, a little bit of a sigh of relief that we're not being forecasted to be above average, especially over the past couple of years. You know, I think El Nino is really the player for this. You know, after three winters in a row with a La Nina and we talked about that in our winter forecast episode back in November, you know, we're transitioning into an El Nino that's warmer than average waters along the equatorial Pacific, basically to tell people to go off the coast of Peru.
And your temperatures are above average. That should stifle some tropical development. You know, at the same time, waters generally in the North Atlantic are above average. That's been the trend for the past couple of decades. We don't see that going away any time soon. So that can really help to fuel some storms. You know, to be honest, not you know, for us at the Jersey Shore, I think, you know, Sean would say something similar.
We never let our guard down. That being said, you know, it could definitely be in a more impactful area like the Gulf Coast or Florida. Yeah. I mean, to that point, you know, anywhere in the Middle Atlantic and southeast coast always needs to be mindful during hurricane season. And, you know, these exercises and the folks at Colorado State have been doing this for 40 years now.
These exercises in seasonal hurricane forecasting are very important so that we get a better understanding of how the ocean and the atmosphere kind of react in this way and what kind of seasons do they produce. You know, I, I don't know if you guys get this, but I still get a lot of like, well, why bother doing this if it only takes one?
Why do you care? Well, one thing we need to understand the ocean and atmosphere better, too. Insurance companies are really interested in this kind of stuff, you know, even if just an individual homeowner or an individual business owner may not care that much or this might not change their preparation to beginning of the season, it's still important in the longer term understanding and ultimately for business impacts as well.
Right now we like to tell people no matter what the outlook is, if one hits your backyard or you get flooded out or whatever, then it's been a bad season for you. I think the classic example of this is Hurricane Andrew in 1992, when that was during a very otherwise relatively quiet season. But obviously, Andrew, the impacts of Andrew in South Florida are still being felt today, which is, you know, 30 years later.
So that's I think the key here is that this is important. It shouldn't change preparation, I think, for anybody. But it is nice to see, you know, for me, I'm really curious because as you said, you were coming off of three consecutive La Ninas. Now we're all the numerical guides is just screw seeming like we're going to get an El Nino.
And that tends to inhibit hurricane development, doesn't prevent it, but of course, it backs it off a fair bit. But at the same time, we've got very high temperatures with respect to normal of the water and the Atlantic. So there's also this kind of academic idea in my head. So which one of these things is going to win out?
You know, and I think to make sure that we're clear for people who aren't familiar, you know, when we're talking about El Nino, we're talking about above normal sea surface temperatures in the Pacific. But we're also seeing above normal season temperatures in the Atlantic. But what the thing is, the Pacific being a larger body of water, when you get those above normal sea surface temperatures and I'm sitting right now, we're in a neutral phase, to be clear.
We've come out of landing and we're in a neutral phase. But already we're seeing a warming trend like the Pacific is getting ready to transition to El Nino. I think that's the question is how quickly does that occur? Because when you get above normal sea surface temperatures in the Pacific, what happens is there's increased wind shear across the Atlantic.
And when there's more wind shear across the Atlantic, higher level winds that tears up these storms and makes it harder for them to form. So typically when you have El Nino, you see reduced tropical activity in the Atlantic and it's the opposite. La Nina and the Pacific causes enhanced tropical activity in the Atlantic because of the reduced wind shear across the Atlantic.
So it's an opposite effect. LA Nina enhances Atlantic hurricane season. El Nino causes it to typically be lower. But the catch this year is we're seeing above normal sea surface temperatures in Atlantic. So you're absolutely right, Sean, Which one of these is going to win out? And I think what it's also going to come down to is how quickly does El Nino form, if it holds off a little bit and doesn't get going?
You know, we don't really see a true El Nino set up and that increased wind shear until September or October. You know, watch out for July and August. I think, because the water is definitely going to be warming up and there's not much wind shear and then we could get some activity. No, it was remarkable how quiet August was last year.
I would be surprised if we had the same results again this year. So, you know, for people who are or who are going to continue to monitor this in the months and weeks ahead, and it's how quickly do we get El Nino to actually set up in the Pacific, the sooner the better, because that will increase the wind shear and make it less likely that hurricanes will form.
But if it takes longer, then I think we have to watch out. You reminded me mad about how quiet we were for a while here with our tropical systems. I believe we went and here we go again. Now, from July 2nd to September 1st, we had not one storm. And typically August is when you really ramp it up.
We had nothing. We ended up calling on the second. Then we had Danielle in September. I believe at that time I believe I believe maybe you guys know, was it the only time we in Tropical history we were without a named storm in August? They remember that. I feel like that was a nugget that seems to stick in in my head, at least in the modern era, at least in the satellite era.
I think that's the case. Again, like you said, I'd have to go back and look it up. My sense and see if you all remember this. The way I do it was that there was a little more Saharan dust in August, the window and or we were in a phase of the Mad Julian oscillation, which also did not favor tropical development.
And that's just off the top of my head. I can't remember that for certain, but I think those two things kind of put a little squashing on the activity in August of last year in a time that would otherwise be fairly act. No, you're 100% right on the dust, Shawn. And I remember that not only for the reason you said, but Florida.
There was a lot of there was a haze in the sky from Florida, from some of that dust as well. And I'm actually looking at the it's called the United States Drought Monitor. And you'll look at Florida. I do believe some of the reason why Florida is in drought right now is because of that dust last summer, which really helped to dry things out.
And they didn't get a lot of rain starting back to last year. And I'm looking at now a year ago, 21% at this time Florida was in drought, now it's 66%. And there was that increase throughout the summer and fall of last year, which got them to that point. So, yeah, I mean, and again, you know, that that was good, that we were that we were quiet, you know, relatively quiet through August.
But then we went to September, got to made up for that really quickly because we had Danielle, Earl, Earl, Fiona Gaston in her mean, we even had a tropical depression in there. And Ian of course that that's that that's pretty close to the Mount Rushmore of most significant hurricane impacts you'll see And what is it with the ice storms, by the way?
I mean, we've noticed this, right? For some reason, the ice storms tend to be the have whether it's just a statistical freak or whatever. But the ice storms, I think, have been more retired than any other storm. You know, when we go through it alphabetically, you know, we have we have these lists of storms. You know, it's repeated every six years or these six list because people like where do they name these things anyway?
Well, there are six main lists for the Atlantic hurricanes. So they're you know, they're repeated every six years. And every once in a while when a storm is especially bad, causes a big loss of property and or there are fatalities. The name is retired because it's such an impactful event. The name doesn't want to be repeated. And that's done by the World Meteorological Organization.
And Ian was retired from last year. And do y'all remember what was the other one that was retired last year? Yeah, that was Fiona. Diana. Yes. Yeah. Which was just like two weeks before Ian did a lot of damage in the Canadian Maritimes of all places. Yeah, Yeah. I think it was the most costly storm to hit Canada.
If I recall. Right, and that's a big reason why I was being retired. It was also damaging in the Caribbean, not really an impact to the U.S., but they don't get you. Typically the cold water kicks in and these things dissipate before they actually make landfall in Canada. But that one did not happen. It was moving fast and came in, I think only as a category one, but a category one in Canada is a big deal.
And so I I'm pretty sure I read that it was the most costly storm. Yeah. And to your point, we always have to be careful about saying only quote unquote category one, because there's still so much water with these things as well. You know, this goes back to the we could speak for like three or 4 hours about the surfer Simpson scale, right.
About impact. And don't don't get so locked in with the category when it comes to impacts because they can rain like like crazy and be quote unquote only a cat one and they could do massive amount of flooding, even though it's only a cat one. I mean, Sandy was a cat one transitioning to an extra tropical cyclone as it came onshore, the Jersey Shore.
And you know, all this I mean, Joe, you know about this way more than I do, buddy. But yeah, yeah. These things, no matter what their category, they do damage. You know, Sandy, of course, was well, it wasn't technically a cat one at landfall as opposed tropical cyclone. Just to speak on behalf of my New Jersey brethren, our last landfalling hurricane was back in the 19 tens.
We have not had a landfalling hurricane since then. Going back to that, I though, Sean, we've had 13 ice storms retired. That is the most and we had three this decade in Aida, which was the year before. And then Iota. Oh, yeah. Do you want to. Yeah, I don't think we should count that though. Because of what? Because it wasn't the ninth one.
Because that whole weird Greek alphabet thing. Wow. Yeah. I mean, do we want to go down that rabbit hole? Well. Well, the other thing is that we don't, you know, we don't do the Greek alphabet anymore. If we run out of names, there's a new. There's a second debris list. So if we run out of the primary list, we don't do this alpha, beta gamma stuff anymore.
Yeah. Which I think is probably much better, but I think people got a little too attached to the Greek letter, like, Oh, we're going Greek, you know. You know, all the fraternity memes come out on Twitter with with the hurricanes and all that good stuff. And then a serious point, You know, what do you do when you have a Greek alphabet storm that was tremendously impactful and, you know, it gets brought up for a vote to be retired because there's no other Greek letter.
I think that was part of the impetus for doing it. If it was. Yeah. Why do you suppose the original impetus, the impetus that's a good that's a good vocab word for it for our Across the Sky podcast listeners, I think with that that was such a great word, Sean. I think, well, we'll take it. That also starts with I know, yes it does it also, but I will retire for a little bit after that.
I and we'll come back in just a minute. Everybody here, thank you for listening. And we've got to in just a second on the across the Sky bond. And welcome back, everyone, to the Across the Sky podcast. Come out with new episodes every Monday. And we do thank you for listening. You know, we have seen our audience steadily grow.
We just had a meeting about how things are going with the big bosses and they were happy with the podcast, so we do appreciate it. If people weren't listening, we would have been canceled. We have not been canceled. We are continuing and if you enjoy the podcast, also give us a wherever you listen to your podcast, give us a review, give us a rating that helps as well.
So do thank you for tuning in and this week's episode all about hurricanes. And the main reason we decided to do a hurricane themed episode, even though it's April and kind of get into the peak of severe weather season, is because Colorado State usually comes out with the first forecasts for the Atlantic hurricane season every year. And they just came out with the one for 2023 and we mentioned it at the top of the episode.
But to recap their forecasts for this Atlantic hurricane season beginning June 1st, 2023, and going through November 30th, they're calling for 13 named storms. And of those 13 named storms, that includes tropical storms and hurricanes. Of those 13 named storms, six becoming hurricanes and two becoming major hurricanes. And compare that to a normal year, we typically see 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes.
So they're basically going one number below the average. And in their reasoning for it, they're conflicting issues with the forecast. So we do expect El Nino to form and wind shear, more wind shear than usual across the Atlantic. So that should hold down activity. But the problem is we're seeing above average sea surface temperatures in the Atlantic. So which one wins out?
And because we're thinking maybe El Nino could end up setting up actually this summer, even before the fall, where they're leaning with El Nino running out just slightly. Just slightly. So basically a near-normal season. But I guess that is better compared to what we dealt with in 2020 and 2021. Now, 2022 was actually near normal, but it was looking like it was going to be above normal season.
I think everybody definitely had some PTSD after 2020 and 21 to blockbuster years, so we kind of caught a break a little bit. But I tell you what, people in Florida, I don't think they caught a break last year with Ian coming through. So again, that was another example of how, you know, it was especially we went through that quiet August and nothing was going on and then, boy, did things change.
So that's why you can't let your guard down, even though it's technically being forecast right now. And there are other forecasters come and we'll see how this all plays out with still, when you're talking about a near average hurricane season, that does not mean you need to go through the motions of not preparing for a hurricane, because we could absolutely have multiple landfalls in the US, you know, and that's the thing we can't forecast is where these things are going to occur.
Are they just going to be out in the middle of the ocean or are they going to make landfall and we can't say that this far out. So, guys, what else are you thinking about this upcoming hurricane season? I'm thinking about some of the the changes that the Hurricane Center has put out every year. They put out this this memo that says what's new and what's updated for the season.
And, you know, in terms of the forecast cone, I think that's always the the the sexy one. That's the one that that we think about the most here. Not much of a change with that forecast cone. There's been a little bit of an adjustment towards a narrower cone 60 and 72 hours out. But we're really talking like a matter of like miles.
And then at 96 and 120 actually expands like three miles at 96 hours, five miles at 120 hours. And that cone and I love to talk about this because I feel like it's time that we need to change the definition of the cone. Right now. It's where the center of the storm is with 66% confidence. And I just think we're so good at forecasting the track and even the intensity of hurricanes, we can make that 75% or something higher.
You know, I, I think people believe that that forecast cone is 100% certainty and it's not. So I always like to get on on that. I think we do such a good job. I think it's time to become a little more confident and expand it. I think there's a lot of merit to that argument. Joe. I think know, after last year and what happened with the end, there was a lot of people revisiting the cone and what the cone really meant.
And we realized, I think we always realize this to a point that people misunderstand the cone. They just don't understand it the way we think they understand it. There's certainly a lot of value in there, but I try to tell people it's an important thing but is not the only thing. I mean, if you think about the last ten or 15 years since the cone has really been very highly visible in forecasting your public facing forecast, I mean, we push the cone out all the time and we haven't done a good enough job.
I mean, not three of us, but I think the community needs to do a better job at saying impacts are not limited to the cone. Sing along if you know the words, the impacts are not limited to the cone. All right. This is our best guess of where the center is going to be. And yeah, near the center, that's where the wind is going to be.
The most ferocious. But impacts extend far away from the cone, especially storm surge. Especially storm surge. I think this is kind of what we need to to drive home even more. You know, we keep working. It's a work in progress. Right. But back to your point about the historical probabilities, Joe, I think we have reached a point where we can do something that's a lot more dynamic.
But this is where we feel with 75% confidence or whatever percent confidence, this is where it's going to be in this timeframe. You know, the other thing I'd like to see this is tougher, but start when we were Hurricane center puts these things out. And of course we've got a new hurricane director, Hurricane Center director from Virginia, which is, you know, cool for out here guy from from Cape Spring, which is where I used to work many moons ago anyway, to to put some place on a map that is clear.
Like we know it's not going here. You plop a big map of the Gulf Coast and you put like, I don't know, let's say New Orleans to Brownsville. That's green. We know absolutely it's not going there. We know that or incorporate something like that. Because one of the things I think a lot of the social science is teaching us as people want to know when they can start paying attention.
They want to know when it's safe, not just they want to know when the threat ends. They want to know when they're safe. And I don't know the best way to do that. That's again, that's a social science question, but I think there is some value in that. If we can do it the right way. Now, John, I think you're absolutely right about letting people know when you don't have to worry anymore, because oftentimes, you know, we start watching these things.
You know, when they come off of Africa as a little tropical wave. And basically we have to tell everybody, look, this has the potential to develop, but we really do not know if this was just going to curve out in the Atlantic, if it's going to make its way in the Caribbean, maybe the Gulf. And so basically have to tell everybody, like the whole East Coast, it has to be on standby for this one.
But that's very early on. And so people and of course, that gets lots of buzz on social media. And then, you know, especially once you do get a story, it looks like it's going to go into the Gulf. Then we have to say the whole Gulf Coast has to be on alert because there's still a lot of uncertainty where this is going to go.
And so then everybody in the Gulf Coast gets all worked up and it's on social media and starts to get nervous. But inevitably, that's why you have to keep following the updates. Don't see one forecast, especially when it's five days out and think, Oh, that's it, it's going to change. They're going to be adjustments. There's going to be greater confidence in where that storm is going to go and wherever is the most likely past five days out, four days out.
That is likely going to change. Unfortunately, That's why we give you a range of possibilities. But I think you're very right, John. At some point, as you get closer and closer to the landfall, the folks that are going to be feeling the impacts, the number does get smaller. And so letting people clearly know like this area, like Louisiana on West does not have to worry about this storm, like making that very clear, because sometimes I do think that gets lost because then people stop hearing about their location and but they're still concerned because they were never given the all clear.
And until somebody hears that all clear, then you get an unnecessary number of people that are overly worked up anxious. They making unnecessary preparations. So yeah, I do think that just as important as messaging, who needs to prepare and who is going to feel the worst impacts, letting people know who is not going to be impacted. And you're absolutely right, that needs to happen as well.
Yeah, and there's been a couple of options out there to change. You know how the cone looks. I've seen some like things where like the cone is like really dark in the where the best forecast is and then, you know, gets a little lighter as you spread out to show some more ideas of the impacts, you know, because anywhere in the cone is at the same you know, has the same you should be concerned anyone within that cone, even if you're not in the middle in the hurricane center, did a good job a couple of years ago.
Maybe you guys remember what year it is. But removing that line, you know, that connects those dots. Now there's the dots sometimes like in my forecast, I don't even show the dots. I just show the cone. But but that was a good call. You know, it's a lot of social science stuff that we keep getting better at and really was triggered a lot by Hurricane Katrina back in 2005 year.
You know, just just looking at some other updates to the Hurricane Center. And I just had it and then I lost it. Hold on. Give me one second, everybody. We're going to do this in real time. So for that, Joe, I think you know what's worthwhile and a big question that a lot of people get, you know, is this is our outlook episode for the upcoming hurricane season.
One of the big questions that always comes up is what names are on the list? Oh, yeah, because remember, there are there are six lists that rotate. So if your name is does come up one year, you're going to have to wait six years for it to come up again. But we do have this year's list, so I'm just going to run down from a through W what the names are and see if your name is on the list number A And I know the problem is if you have a name low in the way down the alphabet, sometimes we never get to that name unless it's a really active hurricane season.
So maybe especially if you have a w the W we don't want to get to the W storm, but we do have it on the list, so let's just run through it real quick. Most likely we will get an Arlene that is Storm one, number one. And also by the way, remember these these names alternate between female and male.
So it's a female name then a male name, a female name, then a male name, and then next year and we'll start with a male name and go to a female name. So Arlene is number one, and then it's Brett. The sea storm is Cindy. Then we have Don, Emily, Franklin, Gert, Harold, I believe it's e Dalia. I've got the pronunciation guide up here to the ice storm.
So a little bit tricky one e dahlia Jose at Tia, I believe it's Katia is how it's pronounced. Lea Margot The end storm is Nigel. Then we have Ophelia, Phillipe, Rena, Sean We've got a Sean on this year's list. I hope we don't make it to the storm, but John as a possibility might use your name this year.
Hammy events. And the storm is Whitney. You know, I actually like this this list this year because most of these are pretty easy to pronounce. There's some years where there are some that are real tough and there's lots of discussion. Exactly how do you say this? And I'm glad the Hurricane Center comes out the pronunciation, guys, because some years their names are a little bit tougher than usual.
And this is an international list of names. It's the World Meteorological Organization. It puts together these names. So that's why it's not just us names. It is names from around the world. And that's why you sometimes hear some unusual odd names, and especially when it comes to the ice storms, because so many have been retired, sometimes have to go and find some rather unique names.
But that is the list for 2023. If either one of you had your names retired, I don't think so. I think I haven't even looked at Hurricane Matthew. Yeah, Yeah. Hurricane Matthew was retired. Okay, That's right. So let's say currently Matt is not on. They probably haven't added Matt to the list. They probably like that die with Matthew.
Yeah, but I don't know. There's been a similar Hurricane Joseph because I've got the list of all six years. I don't see Joseph up here. There's a Josephine Josephine. Yeah. And Jose. Yes. Very close which is going to be Jose's on the list this year is on a list for this year. So I was going to ask you, though, Matt, to have you guys covered those storms with your name and your career like Sean, have you had?
No, because Sean came up because there was another storm that was retired and that name and I forget what storm, but there was an S storm that was retired, I want to say, six or 12 years ago. And then CNN was added to the list. I'd have to go back and look to see what names retire, but that hasn't been on the list that long.
Would it be kind of odd to cover a storm with your name? I'm going to go. Yeah, I remember doing it with a hurricane, Matt. Now, to be clear, I was in Cincinnati, Ohio, at the time. I was working at the Fox station out there because this this storm occurred in late September, early October of 2016. And so I was in Cincinnati at the time.
So I was not being directly impacted by it, but when you have a storm that's impacting the US, every meteorologist in the country is going to talk about it. So I was certainly talking about it. And I think what helped me is though, my my legal name is Matthew. Everybody calls me Matt. So it didn't seem that odd that say, Hurricane Matthew wasn't like I was directly repeating my name.
And everybody was like, Oh, hey, Matt, what's the situation with Matthew? And so it sounded a little bit different. I think that that helped making that statement as as odd because of it being Matthew instead of Matt. And everybody called me Matt. So it wasn't wasn't too hot. And especially because I didn't have to talk about all the times, it hasn't directly impacted me.
And I just looked up Hurricane Stan in 2005 was retired and then my name went into there, Sean. And so Stan knew it was Rick. Sandy was retired the Oh, you're asking and you said Stan was 2005. Sandy, of course, was retired too, but that was 12 was 2012. Yeah, right. So that 423 that doesn't cycle in. So it had to be Stan in oh five.
Gosh. And I guess before we we wrap up this episode kind of go around the horn and talk about our most memorable hurricane experience. I know from again, they start to wind together after a while, you know, and I know some people that were, you know, directly impacted by storms. And I've covered, you know, so many, but most of them indirectly.
But I would have to say my most memorable experience is one that actually I was covering blow by blow and actually experienced at the same time. And that was Hurricane Hanna in 2020 that moved over Deep South Texas. And again, that was a great example of it was just a Category one. But my goodness, were there some tremendous impacts now where it actually made landfall?
Hurricane Hanna You know, I was in the Rio Grande Valley at the time, which is Deep South Texas, Brownsville, McAllen are by the most notable cities down there. Now. It made landfall north of there. Technically, the eye came in just north of the four counties in the valley. But what this storm did is after it made landfall, I took a dive to the south and west.
So it did move over our viewing area and the Rio Grande Valley and the winds were incredible, even though we were technically again, it was already inland, but the winds of this thing was cranking and we weren't even in the most populated part of the valley. It wasn't even in the area with the worst winds. But how much wind damage there was from this was impressive.
So I can't you know, it was hard to imagine, like if this had been a category four, Category five, I mean, it was already just tremendously windy. But I think ultimately, despite the wind damage, the amount of tree damage was done in roof damage. My apartment had shingles removed. There was actually a leak that developed in my apartment.
You know, all these things that end up happening. But ultimately, again, it wasn't It it wasn't the wind that was the worst part. As bad as it was, it was the amount of rain, because what happened is the storm just slowed down and it basically almost stalled out just to the southwest down in Mexico and just kept rotating, though.
And these rounds of rain kept coming in. And even in these rain bands, there were some embedded tornadoes like technically the hurricane itself that passed with these rain bands on the backside of it had some little weak circulations. Well, weak tornadoes popped up on the backside of it. And just the rounds of rain, the flooding that we saw, you know, until you go through a hurricane, you've actually lived through it.
You realize how long they last oftentimes. And just all the different impacts and all the different things. I mean, that's why it's just the most fascinating weather out there, because you can have tornadoes within the hurricane and the flooding in the wind. It was truly an incredible experience. But one was enough. I hope I'm okay not covering with being through another hurricane.
That was that was good. Good for me. Yeah. So for me, it goes back the first time I was in was a first verse incarnation of Hurricane Charley in August of 1986. We were scheduled to go on vacation to the Outer Banks of North Carolina, and and we knew it was coming. Of course, this is 86. All you had was television and radio, and we didn't even have the Weather Channel at my house in Richmond.
So I remember this very well because we decided to go anyway, even though the hurricane was was coming in. And as we were going out the back door to get in the car to drive from Richmond into North Carolina, my mom's like, Should we still go? She looks at me. I'm six years old, weather geek. She looks at me.
Should we still go? I'm like, Well, it's too late to decide now. Let's go. And we went. It was we made it. I mean, we rode it out. We got down there before. Before we had the biggest impacts that actually pushed back off shore. But that was a windy day for sure. We didn't go anywhere that day. And then the rest of the week, the weather was just kind of air, but that was the first when I was legit in in terms of a legit tropical system.
And ironically, because I covered a lot doing through my TV days, I didn't go down to the shore. We always sent somebody else to go cover them at the coastline. I was doing most of the anchoring from the studio, so I haven't been in that many of them. But in terms of other impacts, Isabel is is also one of the the top ones here recently in Virginia.
But, you know, all of our big flooding events here in Virginia are tropical systems. If you go back to Agnes Haight and Hazel, Hazel was big in the fifties, but Agnes Camille left over from one in 85. It's all about the water here now. Yeah. And for me, there's not one weather event I can think of that puts sometimes tears in my eyes.
Then Superstorm Sandy. In 2012, we were without power for without a week. We knew some people who had power loss for more than two weeks. It was a storm, you know, famous for its left turn right into Brigantine, just north of Atlantic City here. And the destruction you saw on our barrier islands was tremendous. And I think the one part that separates New Jersey from other coastal states is that our whole shore is a barrier island and it juts out into the water.
I shouldn't say the whole shore of a 90% of the shore. And the memories in the economy and all the good times you had were laying there in shambles. And that included where I went to a lot every year growing up, which was Seaside, which in many ways was ground zero for the storm. And you know, leading up to it, you knew for days it was going to come.
And, you know, the weather geek society is really excited. You're like, wow, this is a once in a lifetime storm. It is coming right for me. And, you know, you balance that out with, well, jeez, people are going to die. There's going to be damage and there's going to be tremendous devastation. I was at Rutgers at the time.
I was a senior then and I was in charge of our weather TV weather department weather watcher program at the time and, you know, planning coverage for that. And then I think I said this when we talked about our Superstorm Sandy ten year anniversary episode, I ended up getting into a bicycle accident where I ended up with a concussion and I lost teeth, banged up my nose a little bit, and I was literally, you know, just home was if you ever had a concussion with a very empty feeling and you really couldn't you know, I really was just kind of out for the count during the storm.
It was one way I was actually pretty good because classes were canceled for a week and I wasn't going to school anyway. I was concussed. But, you know, when you see the roller coaster that you've been on in the water and you know, you see the places that you used to go, go with with your family and friends, you know, be destroyed.
And there was such a sense of unity among everybody in New Jersey to get this right and to pick things back up and to get us back in action. And, you know, I was I our Rutgers group, we went to Midway Beach, just south of Seaside Heights to participate in the cleanup effort. That's actually how in or in a small way, I'm married to my now wife.
That was like our first kind of like really talked to each other event that we did with that cleanup. So a lot of memories from Sandy. And we talk about it to this day. And, you know, it was the biggest storm on record in terms of size and it's not the worst storm we could have had at the Jersey Shore.
You know, we you know, in our circles here in Jersey, you know, our realistic worst case scenario is a Cat three three that really runs up the coast and provides a you know, it might not be as long lasting as Sandy, but a more powerful strike to the shore. So that's it for me. That's Sandy without a doubt.
Yeah, that's quite the story. Joe, you know, I love hearing you just tell it because, I mean, you can hear the emotion in your voice. You know how impactful that storm was. I did realize that while you were up with that story, there's probably something that we should have mentioned at the beginning of the show that I think we were overlooked.
Our fellow co-host, Kirsten, not with us. And I didn't even mention why at the beginning, but it's kind of a big reason because we also need to mention it because she's not going to be around for a while because as of just yesterday, April 12th, she delivered a baby boy. So she is this is her her third child.
And so she's going to be on maternity leave and flexible leave late June. So she's going to be out for a while. But everything went fine. The baby is healthy. She is doing well. So all is good. We're so happy with that. Is that is in the books for every now and then. She also has some time off to enjoy, enjoy the baby.
And she shared a picture and it does look like a cute baby. I'm going to be honest. I don't think all babies are cute. I most. Wow, you're fired. I think most babies are cute. But be honest. Not not all. Not all are. But but this one is. Sure. Since Baby Maxx, you know, obvious thing. So. But I'm just saying, not all babies are bad.
I think that gets exaggerate a little bit now. You know, you can't say that to anybody. You have to tell everybody the baby's cute. But as honestly say, the Kirsten's babies get they get cuter the day after for sure. There you go. Yeah. No, congratulations to her. We were really happy for her and core part of this podcast.
You know, without her, we wouldn't be doing this in a way in which we are. So she'll be back at the end of June, and I believe it's the end of June. And we're going to we're going to miss our next couple of months. We'll still chat with her, you know, three of us, but we'll have her back here and I'm sure with some some really good stories when we come back.
But, you know, certainly congratulations to her. You can follow her on Facebook, Kirsten Lange and on Instagram as well. I believe it's Kirsten Lang one, if I'm correct with that, I think we're going to wrap, right? That. Yeah, I think so. Yeah. But just wanted to be clear, if you don't hear it. Curious to know she was not fired.
She went make it very clear she's just on maternity leave enjoying some time with the family. But on that note, I hope you enjoyed this early look at hurricane season 2023. And of course, we will have other hurricane related episodes to come as we get closer to the season starting and of course covering all other topics. Weather related.
And one other reminder, if you ever want, there's something you would like to hear us discuss. Contact us on social media. We're always looking for ideas we want to hear discussed. Email, contacts for social media and maybe a topic for next week's episode. But on that note for Sean Sublette in Richmond, Joe Martucci in Atlantic City. I'm Matt Holliner in Chicago.
Thanks for listening, everyone, and we'll catch you next time.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.