NU Online News Service, March 18, 12:28 p.m. EDT

The U.S. coastal area most vulnerable to a hurricane strike this year is the Southeast stretch between the Florida-Georgia Border and Cape Hatteras, N.C., according to a new forecast.

That prediction comes from Guy Carpenter reinsurance brokerage which produces the GC ForeCat product with WSI Corp..

ForeCat regularly evaluates four different regions for their chances of seeing a tropical cyclone make landfall. In addition to the Southeast, the other regions are Northeast from Cape Hatteras to Maine, the entire Florida coastline and the Gulf from the Florida-Alabama border through Texas.

For the Southeast, ForeCat found the land fall rate is .74, a number that represents the mean number of landfalling tropical cyclones, much higher than the .41 average landfall rate for 1951-2007, but lower than last month's forecast rate of .96.

While the ForeCat's latest prediction was slightly less perilous this month for the Southeast, Guy Carpenter said the rate for the Northeast region jumped from .29 in February to .62 in March.

Forecasts for the Florida and Gulf coasts were unchanged and continued to show rates of .60 (above average) for Florida and .59 (below average) for the Gulf.

Special Reports /

Forecast Sees Southeast Facing Biggest 2010 Hurricane Threat

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