COLUMBIA, S.C. — Don will not go away; as it turns out, it has become the first hurricane of the 2023 Hurricane season.
The National Hurricane Center said Saturday afternoon that Don had reached hurricane status with wind speeds of 75 mph. The storm, which has been in the Northern Atlantic, is expected to stay out at sea, so no impacts are expected in the US.
This is a bit ahead of schedule for a typical season, as our average first hurricane typically forms in August. Even with El Nino creating an overall hostile environment for storm development, record Atlantic Ocean temperatures will provide plenty of energy for storms that do form.
Looking elsewhere, Tropical Invest 95-L has been given a medium chance by the NHC of developing into a tropical system in the coming week. The current setup should keep the area of low pressure well south. If anything develops, the storm's motion could change, but the chances of US impacts look relatively low at this point.
Looking past next week, the Climate Prediction Center is expecting elevated amounts of rain in the tropics. This could be a sign of somewhat favorable conditions for tropical development. Models are very spread on the outlooks ahead, with some tropical waves trying to develop in the coming weeks. This means that we will likely have to watch things over the next seven days to see how things trend, but as for a specific forecast, we will be unable to say for now.