The Washington Post was reporting yesterday on the press conference given by government officials in a cavernous airplane hangar at Reagan National Airport.

“The first this year will be christened Ana. There could be as many as 14 more. And some of those might be deadly and destructive.

Government weather officials announced today that there is a good chance that the 2009 hurricane season, which starts June 1, could have between nine and 14 named tropical storms. Four to seven of them could become hurricanes, with as many as three reaching the dangerous Category 3 level or higher on the Saffir-Simpson Scale.

Dire as it sounds, and as unpredictable as the storms can be, the forecast calls for a largely normal hurricane season this year. But officials at a morning press briefing in a cavernous airplane hangar at Reagan National Airport stressed that, with hurricanes, “normal” can still be deadly.

“It needs to be put in perspective,” said Bill Read, director of the National Hurricane Center, noting that about 1,000 people died in tropical cyclones last year.

There were 16 named storms last year, eight of them hurricanes, and five of them major, with winds of 111 mph or more, Read said. An average season has 11 storms, six hurricanes and two major hurricanes.”

Full story in The Washington Post.

Watch the video of the press conference here.