For decades, satellites have watched nearly every swirl of clouds over the Atlantic. In this modern era of storm tracking, the basin has set a record for the latest first hurricane of the season. Since no hurricane formed this season by Sept. 12, it marked the latest date without a hurricane in the satellite era, which began in 1966.

Before the start of the satellite era, storms far from land and passing ships could have been missed, meaning that tropical statistics in prior years may be incomplete.

Before the satellite era, the latest hurricane to form in a season was on Sept. 21, 1941. That record has now been broken as well.

If this year’s Atlantic season has no hurricanes by Nov. 30, that will be only the third such season on record, preceded by 1914 and 1907.

With the peak of hurricane season on average on Sept. 10, it’s unusual not to have a hurricane spinning on that date, but it also happened in 2024 and 2025. Labor Day 2026 also passed with no hurricanes or tropical storms in the Atlantic for the third year in a row. The last time that happened was 1937-1939.

AccuWeather hurricane experts say a strengthening El Niño may limit opportunities for tropical storms to become hurricanes, setting the stage for this historic hurricane drought.