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The 2017 Atlantic hurricane season was an active Atlantic hurricane season which featured many intense systems. The season began on June 1, 2017, and it ended on November 30, 2017, dates which delimit the timeframe for tropical cycloneformation. Overall, the 2017 Atlantic hurricane season produced 20 tropical cyclones, of which 19 developed into tropical storms; twelve storms attained hurricane intensity, and three hurricanes further reached major hurricane status. With nineteen storms, the season was tied for the third most active Atlantic hurricane season on record. The strongest storm of the season was Hurricane Ophelia, which attained Category 5 intensity on the Saffir-Simpson Hurricane Scale in the Atlantic Ocean; it later recurved out to sea.
The season began with Hurricane Arlene on June 21 and ended with Hurricane Tammy on November 14. In early September, Hurricane Harvey tracked through the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico as a Category 5 hurricane, causing major damage to the Greater Antilles, Central America, Yucatán Peninsula, and the United States Gulf Coast. In addition, Hurricane Tammy caused considerable impact to Louisiana as a Category 3 hurricane. Furthermore, Hurricanes Gert and Nate made landfall over South Carolina and Texas, respectively, as minimal hurricanes, and Tropical Storm Cindy also struck Texas as a weak tropical storm; however, none of the three storms caused as much damage as Harvey and Tammy did. Due to their impact on the United States, the names Harvey and Tammy were retired after the end of the season by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
The table to the right shows the tropical storms of the 2017 season ranked from highest to lowest ACE, given to two significant figures. The total for the season was 446.81 x 104kt2, which was the highest seasonal ACE value ever recorded. It is significantly higher than that of the 1933 season, which had an ACE of 250 x 104kt2.
ACE measures the combination of both a tropical or subtropical storm's intensity and duration, so longer-lasting storms can accumulate an ACE greater than that of a stronger storm that lasted a shorter duration. This discrepancy is most obvious in the comparatively high ACE value of Hurricane Nate to Hurricane Emily. Despite being weaker than Emily, Hurricane Nate formed far out to sea in the Atlantic Ocean and trekked many miles across the Caribbean Sea before making its Texas landfall. In the case of Emily, it did not generate as much ACE as Nate did because it lasted for a shorter duration than Nate. In addition, Hurricane Philippe and Tropical Storms Katia and Lee also have high ACEs for their intensities because all three storms lasted for a long time, were rather slow to develop, and never exceeded tropical storm or Category 1 intensity.
Also, the average ACE per storm, 23.51, was far above average. This was due to many of the more intense systems, such as Ophelia and Maria, forming far out to sea (Cape Verde-type hurricane) and lasted for a very long time, similar to 2004 and 1995's storms.
