Hurricane Isaias heads for Gulf Coast as first storm of quiet 2026 season

Hurricane Isaias has become the first Atlantic hurricane of an unusually quiet 2026 season, tying a record set in 1905 for the latest-forming first hurricane of a season. The storm is projected to make landfall along the northern Gulf Coast late on October 9 or early October 10.

Preparations are underway in Alabama and the Florida Panhandle, where residents and business owners are boarding up windows and preparing sandbags to mitigate the impact of damaging winds, rain, and storm surges. At Tyndall Air Force Base, officials have begun evacuating fighter jets.

Atmospheric scientists attribute the unprecedentedly quiet start to the 2026 El Niño event. Typically, the Atlantic region sees several hurricanes by early October, but a strong El Niño—characterized by warming ocean surface temperatures in the central and eastern Pacific—has played a significant role in suppressing storm formation throughout the first two-thirds of the season.