It is time to re-examine the earlier forecast and to lower the numbers considerably. Four realities influence this update; 1) The Atlantic basin between the African west coast and 75W and between 10N and 30N now has much cooler sea surface temperatures than at this time a year ago. 2) A weak El Nino is now firmly in place in the equatorial Pacific and has small areas of moderate strength - particularly near 150W. Although this El Nino event may fluctuate over the next few months, the trend in the past few months has been toward a general warming and the NCEP forecasts reflect this trend. The following years had a similar El Nino trend: 1957, 1972, 1982, 1991 and 1993. 3) The Azores-Bermuda High shows no signs of becoming a major player and the Atlantic exhibits anything but a classic pattern so far this season. 4) Above 10N the African continent has been quite dry with almost all of the wave activity located about 200-250 miles south of where it would need to be in order to generate cyclonic systems. These long period patterns take time to change and no change seems imminent. With the reality of fewer waves and a cooler and chaotic Atlantic, the forecast numbers for tropical cyclone activity need to be lowered. Here is my updated forecast for this season:

9 Named Storms
4 Hurricanes
1 Major Hurricane
1 U.S. hurricane landfall
2 U.S. tropical storm landfalls

The problem with early season forecasts is that they ultimately hinge on ENSO forecast activity and that Pacific basin SST trends are often hard to determine, let alone forecast. There is often a lag of about 3 or 4 months between the onset of an established El Nino (or La Nina) event and its ultimate impact on the Atlantic hurricane season, so my expectation is that the latter part of the Atlantic hurricane season will be curtailed by the El Nino event. Systems forming to the southwest of the Cape Verde Islands will probably be an uncommon event this year. I expect the southern Caribbean and the Gulf to be the active areas this season. Please chime in with your own two-cents worth on the upcoming season!
Cheers,
ED