The typically unremarkable central Pacific hurricane basin has seen a surprising uptick in storms in late July as both major Hurricane Iona and Tropical Storm Keli spin harmlessly far from land.
"The central Pacific Ocean is in the midst of an unusual tropical cyclone 'outbreak,' recording two concurrent named storms for the first time since 2015 and its first major (Category 3 or stronger) hurricane since Dora in August 2023," said WPLG-TV hurricane expert Michael Lowry in an e-mail on July 29.
Fortunately, "there is currently no immediate threat to the Hawaiian Islands from these systems," the National Weather Service in Honolulu said on July 29.
While the twin storms in the central Pacific is "unusual," it's still a far cry from the all-time records set in the Atlantic and eastern Pacific basins: According to the National Hurricane Center, there have been as many as five active Atlantic tropical cyclones at once, which occurred Sept. 10-12, 1971. In the eastern Pacific, on Aug. 26, 1974, there were five simultaneous named storms of at least tropical storm strength, Phil Klotzbach, a tropical scientist at Colorado State University, told weather.com.
While eastern Pacific tropical storms and hurricanes can affect the west coast of Mexico and their remnants occasionally affect the Southwest U.S. with drenching rain, central Pacific storms usually miss all land areas, though they can sometimes affect Hawaii.
