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Research Divisions

Group Members :
Shirley Murillo
Bachir Annane
Nick Carrasco
Russel St. Fleur
Sonia Otero
Neal Dorst
Jason Dunion

Objective :
To support projects associated with improved analysis of surface wind fields in tropical cyclones. H*Wind is a global tropical cyclone observing system designed to integrate observations from land-, sea-, space-, and air-based measurement platforms to provide:

• Magnitude and extent of damaging winds in realtime or retrospectively and serve as the 'Analysis of Record'.
• Forcing for storm surge and wave modeling; assist wind engineering community in establishing 'design event'.
• Observation-based analysis to serve as a basis for evaluating new wind measurement systems.
• Prototype products for input to geographic information system based decision support tools (e.g. DHS-FEMA's HAZUS).
• New metrics for evaluating destructive potential in tropical cyclones.

Methods:

• All measurement platforms are processed to a common framework: 10 m, max 1 min wind, marine or open exposure.
• Oracle 9i database, JAVA, J2EE, winner of JAVA and Tech Transfer awards at NOAATech 2000, 2002.
• Observations plotted relative to the storm center over a 3-6 h period during which conditions are assumed stationary.
• All observations passing QC are objectively analyzed via least squares Þtting with a derivative constraint.
• Analysis winds represent 'open terrain' over land and marine exposure over the sea.
• Valuable research tool for analysis and forecast validation.
• Products include snapshots, swaths, shape files, and gridded files.

Accomplishments:

• First ever realtime tower data into realtime tropical cyclone wind field analysis
• First ever feed of wind swath data to realtime damage assessment HAZUS software at FEMA.
• High frequency, large domain wind field snapshots for Hurricanes Betsy 1965, Lili (2002) and Isidore (2002).
• Over 100 realtime analyses of 2003 season tropical cyclones.
• Technical review panel final report to Army Corps of Engineers on ADCIRC model for New Orleans District.
• Technical guidance to National Institute of Building Sciences and FEMA for HAZUS via the Wind Committee.
• Development of Integrated Kinetic Energy metric for evaluating the destructive potential of tropical cyclones.

References :

• Powell, M. D. and T. A. Reinhold, 2007: Tropical Cyclone Destructive Potential by Integrated Kinetic Energy. Bull. Amer. Met. Soc., 88,, pp. 513-526.

• Houston, S. H., W. A. Shaffer, M. D. Powell, and J. Chen, 1999: Comparisons of HRD and SLOSH surface wind fields in hurricanes: Implications for storm surge and wave modeling. Wea. Forecast., 14, 671-686.

• Powell, M. D., and S. H. Houston, 1999: Comments on "A multiscale numerical study of Hurricane Andrew (1992). Part I: Explicit simulation and verification." Mon. Wea. Rev., 127, 1706-1710.

• Coauthor, NRC Committee Report: 1999: Review of the need for a large-scale test facility for research on the effects of extreme winds on structures. National Research Council, National Academy Press, Washington D. C. ISBN-0-309-06483-X.

• Powell, M. D., S. H. Houston, L. R. Amat, and N Morisseau-Leroy, 1998: The HRD real-time hurricane wind analysis system. J. Wind Engineer. and Indust. Aerodyn. 77 & 78, 53-64

• Powell, M. D., and S. H. Houston, 1998: Surface wind fields of 1995 Hurricanes Erin, Opal, Luis, Marilyn, and Roxanne at landfall. Mon Wea. Rev., 126, 1259-1273.

• Coauthor, USWRP PDT-5 Report, 1998: Tropical Cyclones: Forecast problems and associated research opportunities. Bull. Amer. Met. Soc., 79, No.2 , 305-323

• Coauthor, USWRP PDT-3 Report, 1997: Coastal Meteorology and Oceanography: Report of the third prospectus Development team of the USWRP to NOAA and NSF. Bull. Amer. Met. Soc., 77, No. , 1578-1585

• Powell, M. D., S. H.Houston, and T. A. Reinhold, 1996: Hurricane Andrew's Landfall in South Florida. Part I: Standardizing measurements for documentation of surface wind fields. Weather Forecast., 11, 304-328.

• Powell, M. D., and S. H. Houston, 1996: Hurricane Andrew's Landfall in South Florida. Part II: Surface Wind Fields and Potential Real-time Applications. Weather. Forecast., 11, 329-349.

H*wind archive page

Last modified: 11/1/2007