This article is by Mathew Dib (CMet, FRMetS), Duty Director of Marine Operations at Pole Star Global.
Early forecasts for the 2026 Atlantic hurricane season are relatively restrained. There is something of a consensus that the outlook is sitting somewhere close to the long-term average, with a few projections expecting activity to land slightly below what the North Atlantic basin has seen and produced over the last few years. In a typical year, that would translate to a fairly straightforward season for shipping operators. The forecast itself looks manageable, but the conditions underpinning it are less settled.
A large part of this tension is a result of competing influences across the Atlantic and Pacific pushing in different directions. This is because El Niño conditions are expected to become more established as the season progresses which would usually suppress hurricane activity across the Atlantic. At the same time, waters across parts of the North Atlantic basin, particularly the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean, remain unusually warm and continue to support storm development. Those conditions do not sit neatly alongside one another from a forecasting perspective, though, making it harder for ship owners and operators to plan around early forecasts alone, as Mathew Dib (CMet, FRMetS), Duty Director of Marine Operations at Pole Star Global, explains.
The basin is not behaving consistently
According to NOAA’s latest outlook, the likelihood of El Niño during the core hurricane months this season is around 90%. For the Atlantic, that usually means stronger upper-level winds and more vertical wind shear, conditions that can make it harder for tropical systems to organise. Alongside this, sea temperatures across parts of the Atlantic, particularly the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean, remain elevated.
While warm water in isolation does not produce hurricanes, it does leave additional energy available if atmospheric conditions briefly become conducive to stronger storm development.
That is part of the reason this season feels difficult to call with much confidence. Overall activity could remain relatively moderate, while individual systems still intensify quickly during shorter periods where conditions temporarily align. This creates a challenge for shipping operators. Even during a season with relatively few storms, they can be hit with significant disruption if a small number of systems strengthen rapidly or affect key trade routes.
There are other variables at play here too. The Bermuda-Azores High will have a role to play in influencing trade winds and the path storms are likely to take later in the season, while Saharan dust outbreaks could still play a part in suppressing development across parts of the Atlantic. Both matter, but neither is especially easy to assess this far ahead, particularly with the wider basin already behaving unevenly.
Storm totals rarely tell the full story
For shipping operators, seasonal hurricane forecasts have always come with limitations. They provide a broad indication of how active a basin may become over several months. What they cannot really show is how disruption develops once storms begin affecting routes, ports and vessel schedules in real time and when it plays out at sea.
Last year’s season was a useful example, as figures from NOAA show . Activity stayed fairly subdued early in the year before several intense storms later in the season, three of which ended up being Category 5 hurricanes (Erin, Humberto, and Melissa). Overall storm numbers stayed quite close to average, although some of these systems became unusually intense and long-lasting. Operationally, this matters because disruption is rarely tied to the overall storm count alone.
A single storm moving through the Gulf or Caribbean during a busy trading period, for example, can begin affecting schedules surprisingly quickly. Routes narrow, berth windows move and delays start spreading through wider rotations. Quite often, routing decisions are being made while forecasts are still moving from one advisory cycle to the next.
That is why many operators now use preseason forecasts more as background context than as a planning tool on their own.
Planning around conditions as they change
Weather planning has gradually become more continuous over recent seasons. By the time a storm is fully organised, many operational decisions are already underway. This places more emphasis on live monitoring and understanding what changing conditions mean for a particular vessel or voyage in practical terms. Sea-state limitations, routing flexibility, cargo sensitivities and commercial schedules all affect how much room there is to adapt once conditions begin tightening.
Forecast models remain central to the process, but operators increasingly rely on live data and continuous monitoring once conditions begin changing at sea. This still requires judgement, particularly when systems are evolving quickly. In practice for those at sea, that may involve adjusting speed earlier than planned, altering a route before congestion develops elsewhere, or delaying a transit while conditions settle. By the time conditions deteriorate significantly, the range of available options at sea is often already narrowing.
For operators moving through the Atlantic, Gulf and Caribbean this year, maintaining flexibility once conditions begin shifting may matter more than the headline seasonal outlook itself.
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