A very busy 2024 Atlantic hurricane season is still likely, according to NOAA forecasters.

And there could potentially be a new tropical system to keep an eye on next week.

NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center updated its outlook for the remainder of the 2024 Atlantic hurricane season this week, and only made minor changes.

A very active Atlantic is still favored for the rest of the season, which ends on Nov. 30.

NOAA released its first hurricane season outlook in May. It called for 17-25 named storms, eight to 13 hurricanes and four to seven major hurricanes (Category 3 or stronger storms).

The new outlook is very similar. It is predicting 17-24 named storms (including the four we’ve had already), eight to 13 hurricanes and four to seven major hurricanes.

An average hurricane season in the Atlantic has 14 named storms, seven hurricanes and three major hurricanes.

There have already been four named storms.

Alberto and Chris were tropical storms that struck Mexico’s Gulf Coast. Beryl was the first hurricane and made history in early July by becoming the earliest Category 5 hurricane on record in the Atlantic. It made three landfalls, the final one in Texas. Then there was Hurricane Debby, which struck Florida’s Big Bend region on Monday as a Category 1 hurricane and made a second landfall as a tropical storm in South Carolina.

Debby had been ruled a post-tropical storm as of Friday but was still spreading flooding rain and tornado warnings into the mid-Atlantic region and the Northeast.

NOAA cited several factors in maintaining its forecast for a busy season:

* Warmer-than-average sea surface temperatures in the tropical Atlantic and Caribbean.

* Reduced vertical wind shear (which allows tropical systems to develop and strengthen).

* Weaker trade winds.

* An enhanced west African monsoon, which can send more weather systems into the eastern Atlantic that can develop into storms.

NOAA said all those things are expected to continue into the fall.

Forecasters also added that the dry Saharan air that prevented tropical storm development at times this summer is expected to back off going forward.

The National Hurricane Center was also tracking another tropical wave on Friday that will be something for those in the Caribbean to keep an eye on next week.

The hurricane center said the tropical wave was located several hundred miles to the west-southwest of the Cabo Verde Islands off Africa’s west coast on Friday morning.

Forecasters expect it to develop slowly over the next few days, but it could organize and become a tropical depression by early next week, when it could be approaching the Lesser Antilles.

As of Friday morning the system had a 60 percent probability of becoming a tropical depression in the next seven days.

As of Friday morning there were no other systems being monitored for development.

The Atlantic hurricane season ends on Nov. 30.