ASK THE METEOROLOGIST
“Is it possible for a really small hurricane to be happening and for nobody to know about it?”
Marcus, Mae Richardson
Love this question Marcus! In this day and age, it would be very unlikely that a hurricane would develop and it would remain unknown. There are many resources available to meteorologists these days that allow us to constantly monitor weather conditions across the globe.
The primary reason we are always able to track hurricanes is because NOAA has satellites up in outer space. There are two primary satellites that provide satellite images for the globe throughout the day — GOES & POES. Because we are able to see cloud cover anywhere and everywhere, we can always pinpoint where there are storms. Hurricanes tend to be large areas of low pressure, often times they are hard to miss on satellite imagery.
When they are small, we can watch their evolution on hour loops. We also have buoys in the ocean that measure weather parameters like ocean temperatures, winds, etc. Sea surface temperatures are very important for the growth and strength of tropical disturbances.
The National Hurricane Center is a governmental agency whose sole responsibility is to monitor the U.S. oceans for tropical disturbances. For this reason, tropical systems are always well monitored!