The Atlantic Ocean has been dishing out hurricanes and tropical storms at a frightening pace this season. So does this mean Australia will have an equally frenetic tropical cyclone season?

Hurricanes, tropical cyclones and typhoons are all the same thing with different names. Put simply, they're all deep areas of low pressure that develop over tropical waters in different parts of the world.

Australia's tropical cyclone season runs from November 1 until April 30, while the Atlantic hurricane season goes from June 1 to November 30. These are the times of year that each region experiences their warmest sea surface temperatures, which provide the fuel for tropical storms.

-- Atlantic entering uncharted territory --

In the Atlantic Ocean, low pressure systems are given the following classifications based on their maximum wind speeds:

• Tropical depression: ≤ 62 km/h
• Tropical storm: 63-118 km/h
• Hurricane: ≥119 km/h

Once a system reaches 'tropical storm' strength, it is assigned a name from a predetermined list that runs alphabetically and alternates between male and female.

In an average season, there are usually around 11 named systems (tropical storms or hurricanes) in the Atlantic basin. This season, there have already been 28, which is the equal highest number of named storms on record, matching the hyper-active season 2005. That year became famous for spawning Hurricane Katrina, a chart-topping category 5 system that was the costliest hurricane on record at the time.

Image: Hurricane Laura making landfall over the US state of Louisiana in late-August 2020. Source: NASA

In fact, the 2020 season has been so active that the standard list of names was exhausted by mid-September, forcing the US National Hurricane Centre to start using names from the Greek alphabet.

The only other year to spill over into the Greek alphabet was 2005, when Tropical Storm Alpha formed on October 22. Impressively, the 2020 season has outpaced 2005 by more than a month, with Tropical Storm Alpha forming on September 18 this year.

With another month left to go in the Atlantic hurricane season, there's a good chance that this year's running tally of named storms will reach 29 for the first time on record.

-- Now it's Australia's turn --

So what does this all mean for the tropical cyclone season in Australia?

There are no direct links between the North Atlantic hurricane season and Australia's tropical cyclone season, as they operate in separate ocean basins.

However, this year will be underpinned by La Niña in the Pacific Ocean, which is likely to boost the overall number of tropical cyclones in the Australian region.

Australia gives names to tropical cyclones that produce wind speeds of at least 63km/h. Like America, we assign names using a predetermined alphabetical list that alternates between male and female.

In an average season, we would usually see around 11-12 tropical cyclones in Australia's area of responsibility between November and April. Around three or four of these systems typically make landfall.

This could be an above-average season on both counts, however there's no way of knowing whether it will be a record-breaker just yet.

The first name on the list for Australia this season will be Imogen, followed by Joshua and Kimi.