Tropical storms swirl at same time in tropical Atlantic, a first in June

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — Tropical Storm Cindy has formed behind Tropical Storm Bret, in the first case of two storms in the tropical Atlantic in June since record keeping began in 1851, forecasters said Friday.

The historic event signals an early and aggressive start to the Atlantic hurricane season that began June 1 and usually peaks from mid-august to midoctober. Some forecasters blamed unusually high sea temperatures for the rare development.

“The Atlantic is awfully warm this year,” said Kerry Emanuel, a meteorologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, adding that it’s partly a result of global warming, natural variability and the ocean’s recovering from sulfate aerosols pollution that cooled it decades ago.

Studies show that a warmer world is producing wetter and more intense hurricanes, with scientists still trying to figure out if climate change alters how many storms brew. Because of more early and preseason storms, the National Hurricane Center has started issuing advisories earlier in the year, with experts recently discussing the idea of declaring the start of the hurricane season earlier.

Emanuel noted that in the entire Atlantic Ocean, not just the tropical Atlantic, it’s not unusual to have storms in June. It has happened 34 times — including this year — since 1851, he said.

Cindy is expected to remain a tropical storm as it heads northeast into open waters.

Meanwhile, Bret brought winds, heavy rain and swells of up to 15 feet early Friday to islands in the eastern Caribbean that shut down to prepare for potential landslides and flooding. Officials in the French Caribbean island of Martinique said they found four people who were aboard a lifeboat after their catamaran sank during the storm, and that they were hospitalized.

Power outages were reported in St. Vincent and the Grenadines, with at least 130 people seeking protection in government shelters as the storm washed away one home and caused severe damage to several others, according to officials.

Ralph Gonsalves, prime minister for St. Vincent and the Grenadines, told NBC Radio, a local station, on Friday that officials are still assessing the damage and are helping those in need.

“We will respond, as always, with speed,” he said.

Authorities in Barbados said they received more than a dozen reports of damage across the island, according to the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency.

Bret was expected to lose strength after entering the eastern Caribbean Sea and was forecast to dissipate by the weekend.