FAIRHOPE, Ala. — The 2009 Atlantic Hurricane Season could produce fewer storms this year, according to Colorado State University forecasters. A CSU report, issued Tuesday and co-authored by Dr. Philip Klotzbach and Dr. William Gray, indicates the team is predicting an average season, with the Atlantic basin generating 12 named storms between June 1 and Nov. 30.

Six of the storms are projected to become hurricanes. Only two of those are expected to develop into major hurricanes (Saffir/Simpson Scale Category 3-5) , with sustained winds of 111 mph or more.

“It looks like less action than what we thought in early December,” Klotzbach said in a phone interview prior to boarding a plane bound for Austin, Texas, where he will attend the annual National Hurricane Conference.

The CSU tropical meteorology team projected Dec. 10 that there would be 14 named storms in 2009, with seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes. The long-term averages are 9.6 named storms, 5.9 hurricanes and 2.3 intense hurricanes annually.

Klotzbach said a La Niña system was in play at the time of their last forecast, and its existence helped formulate their predictions. Since then, the pendulum has started swinging the other way, and the “good witch” of Gulf Coast weather, an El Niño, has begun to form.

“We expect current weak La Niña conditions to transition to neutral and perhaps weak El Niño conditions by this year’s hurricane season,” Gray stated. “If El Niño conditions develop for this year’s hurricane season, it would tend to increase levels of vertical wind shear and decrease levels of Atlantic hurricane activity.”

Also adding to the conditions that might tamp down hurricane development is the unexpected cooling of sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic.

Klotzbach said temperatures there have decreased one to three degrees Fahrenheit over the last few months, adding, “It’s an anomaly. The degree of deviation is the most since 1994.”

Cooler waters are associated with dynamic and thermodynamic factors that are less conducive for hurricanes to form and gain strength.

There is a 54 percent probability of a major hurricane making landfall along the U.S. coast this year, according to Klotzbach. He noted the average over the last 100 years is 52 percent, adding the new projection shows a season about as active as the 1950-2000 hurricane seasons.

The forecasters predict a 31 percent chance that a major hurricane will make landfall on the Gulf Coast from the Florida panhandle west to Brownsville, Texas this season. The long-term average is 30 percent.

Klotzbach and Gray have also projected a 32 percent chance a strong storm will strike the East Coast (including the Florida peninsula), and an average major hurricane landfall risk in the Caribbean.

As far as duration, the CSU team is forecasting 55 named storm days, 25 hurricane days and five intense hurricane days.

Other information released by CSU suggests the current conditions are similar to those seen during the 1951, 1968, 1976, 1985 and 2001 seasons. The average of the five seasons indicates about average activity, and Klotzbach and Gray predict the 2009 season will have activity in line with the average of those five years.

That translates into tropical cyclone activity of 105 percent of the average season. Last year, the Atlantic basin produced a season that was 160 percent of the average.

Klotzbach said the global oceanic and atmospheric conditions, like El Niño, sea surface temperatures and sea level pressures preceding hurricane seasons in the past, provide meaningful information about similar trends seen in later years. The team is aided by a new early April statistical model they began using last year.

“The skill of the models is sometimes questionable because (El Niño) is hard to predict,” Klotzbach acknowledged. But he said the CSU model was very successful in predicting the 2008 season outcome because of the hindsight gleaned from conditions recorded between 1950 and 2007.

Klotzbach pointed out many of the storms that reach the United States form off the west coast of Africa. He added, “Alabama gets those forming in the Gulf and Caribbean as well, but hopefully we’ll have a slow year.”

The team will issue forecast updates on June 2, Aug. 4, Sept. 2 and Oct. 1. The August, September and October forecasts will include separate predictions for August-only, September-only and October-only Atlantic basin tropical cyclone activity.