The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration or NOAA is predicting a near-normal hurricane season in the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific basins and a below-normal season in the Central Pacific.
Many residents of the U.S. Atlantic coast head into this year's hurricane season, which starts June 1, with still-vivid recollections of Hurricane Katrina's destruction. The 2008 storm flooded 80 percent of New Orleans, leaving hundreds of thousands of people homeless.
And this August marks the 20th anniversary of Hurricane Andrew, the category-5 hurricane that devastated South Florida, causing more than US$26 billion in damage.
The National Weather Service's Chris Vaccaro says Andrew's lesson is: be ready. "Hurricane Andrew was the first storm in a very late-starting season that only produced 6 storms," Vaccaro said.
The season average is 12 named storms. NOAA forecasters laid out their predictions Thursday for the 2012 Atlantic hurricane season for the region covering the Eastern and Gulf Coasts of the U.S. as well as Caribbean nations.
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