Spaghetti models are dozens of computer forecasts of a storm’s track plotted together. When the strands cluster tightly, confidence is high; when they fan out across 500 miles of coastline, the honest answer is “not yet known” — and anyone giving you a confident landfall point five days out is guessing. Watch the trend from run to run, not any single line.
The NHC forecast cone is misread every hurricane season. It shows where the storm’s center travels two-thirds of the time — it says nothing about size. Damaging wind, surge and rain routinely extend well outside the cone, and one-third of storms leave it entirely. Never relax because you are “outside the cone.”
Watch vs. warning: a hurricane watch means conditions are possible within 48 hours — finish preparations; a warning means they are expected within 36 — act now. Formation odds, wind shear and sea temperatures above tell you what the basin can brew next, and My Weather shows the alerts for your exact address the moment NHC and your local NWS office issue them.
Live list of every named system, straight from NHC.
Central Pacific, West Pacific and Indian Ocean.
Surge, wind and rainfall — what actually does the damage.
