Hurricane formation
Most hurricanes that threaten the east coast form in the central atlantic - so Barabados makes sense as a base due to the large American embassy there. It's also well east of many of the other islands in the eastern caribbean chain, so they can get an eye on the forming depressions earlier.
Of course the storms that threaten the Gulf coast mostly form in the central caribbean (especially early in the season), so I wouldn't be surprised if they start basing this out of Puerto Rico soon if all goes well (the manned Hurricane Hunters fly out of Florida and PR mostly). Or maybe they'll just use the UAV's on the early storms - when they're weaker and don't need the faster reflexes of a pilot in-plane vs. the latency of pilot-miles-away.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
