Professionals, Mentor, and Documentation

I chose a number of field professionals to interact with – approximately twenty – from professors at universities involved with hurricane research as well as from hurricane researchers at the Hurricane Research Division (HRD) and forecasters working for the National Hurricane Center (NHC). Since twenty is a lot of people to give even brief descriptions about, here is a little bit about each of the professional who responded to me.

Professor Evans, a professor of tropical Penn State University, who teaches and researches tropical meteorology

Kerry Emanuel, professor of meteorology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Mark Bourassa, professor of meteorology at Florida State University

Phil Klotzbach, a professor of meteorology at Colorado State University, co-head of a team that makes the second most famous yearly hurricane forecast

Howie Friedman, the deputy director of the HRD

Mark Powell, researcher of tropical meteorology at the HRD

Sim D. Aberson, a researcher of tropical meteorology at the HRD

Sylvie Lorsolo, a researcher of tropical meteorology at the HRD

James Franklin, the current branch chief of NHC

Stacy Stewart, senior hurricane specialist at the NHC.

I chose all of these people for some hopefully obvious reasons – they are all involved in some form of meteorology, either through forecasting or research. They are either professors at major universities, forecasters at the National Hurricane Center, or paid researchers at the Hurricane Research Division in Miami, FL.

For documentation, I kept a journal of my thoughts and ideas, as I thought this was the best method of recording not only all of my thoughts, but an evolution of my ideas as I gained more knowledge and insight throughout the year. Looking back, I’m able to see where I went wrong (and right), so when I do other research projects later in life, I will have a much better idea of how to formulate my initial plans and ideas.

Finally, I chose my mentor, Jason Dunion, because of his connection to the Hurricane Research Division as well as his willingness and eagerness to help me along with this project. Without him, I doubt what I accomplished would have been possible.

First Semester Bibliography

American Meteorological Society . (n.d.). AMS Glossary . Retrieved January 1, 2010, from http://amsglossary.allenpress.com/glossary/search?id=warm-low1

Australian Government Bureau of Meteorology . (n.d.). BoM - Tropical Cyclone Frequently Asked Questions . Retrieved January 1, 2010, from http://www.bom.gov.au/weather/wa/cyclone/about/faq/faq_def_6.shtml

Barber, B. (2009). Sandbox for Mapping, Viewing, and Analyzing Atlantic Hurricane Data . Retrieved October 14, 2009, from http://db.hellohelp.net/hurdat_storms/storm_search.php

Booth, M. A., T. Lambert, J. Blackerby, and R. L. Elsberry, 2006: Accuracy of tropical cyclone intensity forecasts in the North Pacific and Atlantic. AMS 27th Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology. 24-28 April, Monterey, CA. [available online at http://ams.confex.com/ams/pdfpapers/108805.pdf]

Bosart, L. F., Velden, C. S., Bracken, W. E., Molinari, J., & Black, P. G. (2000). Environmental Influences on the Rapid Intensification of Hurricane Opal (1995). Monthly Weather Review , 322-352.

Center, N.H. (2005, January 5). Tropical Cyclone Report – Hurricane Charley. Retrieved January 1, 2010, from http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/TCR-AL032004_Charley.pdf

Center, N. H. (2009, January 22). Tropical Cyclone Report - Hurricane Gustav. Retrieved January 1, 2010, from http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pdf/TCR-AL072008_Gustav.pdf

DeMaria, M. (2004, January 29). Description of the Extended Best Track File. Retrieved January 1, 2010, from ftp://rammftp.cira.colostate.edu/demaria/ebtrk/readme16.txt

DeMaria, M., J.A Knaff, and C. Sampson, 2007: Evaluation of long-term trends in tropical cyclone intensity forecasts. Meteorol. Atmos. Phys., 97, 19-28.

DeMaria, M., & Kaplan, J. (1994). Sea Surface Temperature and the Maximum Intensity of Atlantic Tropical Cyclones . Journal of Climate , 1324-1334

Elsberry, R. T.D.B Lambert, and M. A. Boothe, 2007: Accuracy of Atlantic and Eastern North Pacific tropical cyclone intensity forecast guidance, Wea. Forecasting, 22, 747-762.

Emanuel, K. A. (1999). Thermodynamic Control of Hurricane Intensity. Nature , 665-669.

Erb, M.P. (2006). A Case Study of Hurricane Katrina: Rapid Intensification in the Gulf of Mexico. Preprints,20th National Conference on Undergraduate Research, Asheville NC.

Frank, W. M., and E. A. Ritchie, 2001: Effects of vertical wind shear on the intensity and structure of numerically simulated hurricanes. Mon. Wea. Rev., 129, 2249-2269.

Gibbs, W. (1955). 200mb Divergence Associated with Rapid and Intense Cyclogenesis. Central Meteorological Bureau, Melborne , 1-18.

Jarvinen, B.R., C.J. Neumann, and M.A.S. Davis, 1984: A tropical cyclone data tape for the North Atlantic basin, 1886-1983: Contents, limitations, and uses. NOAA Tech. Memo. NWS. NHC 22, Miami, FL, 21 pp. [Available from National Technical Information Service, U.S. Department of Commerce, 5285 Port Royal Road, Springfield, VA 22151.]

Kaplan, J. (Performer). (2008). A revised rapid intensification index for the Atlantic and E. Pacific basins. Orlando, FL, USA.
http://ams.confex.com/ams/28Hurricanes/wrfredirect.cgi?id=9472

Kaplan, J., & DeMaria, M. (2003). Large-Scale Characteristics of Rapidly Intensifying Tropical Cyclones in the North Atlantic Basin. Weather and Forecasting , 1093–1108.

Kaplan, J., & DeMaria, M. (2006). Estimating the Likelihood of Rapid Intensification in the Atlantic and E. Pacific Basins using SHIPS Model Data. AMS Conference , 1-4.

Kossin, J. and W. H. Schubert, 2001: Mesovortices, polygonal flow patterns, and rapid pressure falls in hurricane-like vortices. J. Atmos. Sci., 58, 1079-1090.

Landsea, C. (n.d.). HRD: FAQs. Retrieved January 1, 2010, from http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/tcfaq/D7.html

Merrill, R. T. (1988). Enviromental Influences on Hurricane Intensification. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences , 1678-1687.

Molinari, and, D. Vallaro, 1990: External influences on hurricane intensity. Part II:
Vertical structure and response of the hurricane vortex. J. Atmos. Sci., 47, 1902-1918.

National Hurricane Center . (2009 ). NHC Archives of Hurricane Seasons . Retrieved October 14, 2009, from http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastall.shtml

National Hurricane Center. (2009, January 1 ). Extended Best Track File . Retrieved January 1, 2010, from ftp://rammftp.cira.colostate.edu/demaria/ebtrk/ebtrk_atlc.txt

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (n.d.). 48 Hour Track Errors - "Early" Guidance . Retrieved January 1, 2010, from http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/verification/figs/Early_model_ATL_trk_error_trend.gif

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. (2008 ). Easy to Read HURDAT 2008 . Retrieved October 15, 2009, from http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/hurdat/easyread-2008.html

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration . (2009). Daily Climate Composits. Retrieved October 12, 2009, from http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/data/composites/day/

Schade, L. R., & Emanuel, K. A. (1999). The Ocean’s Effect on the Intensity of Tropical Cyclones. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences , 642-651.

Scotti, R. A. (2003). Sudden Sea: The Great Hurricane of 1938. Little, Brown.

University of Illinois . (n.d.). History of GOES . Retrieved January 15, 2010, from GOES-1 through GOES-7: http://ww2010.atmos.uiuc.edu/%28Gl%29/guides/rs/sat/goes/oldg.rxml

Culminating Theory

My culminating theory for this semester is that the Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) index can and should be updated to include storm size as a measure. For this, I created a revised index, aptly named RACE (Revised Accumulated Cyclone Energy - inventive, no?). My evidence is within the following formula described further on this journal entry - the integral of (10^-4)*2pi*r*[(velocity of outer wind radius) x (outer radius – r)/(outer radius – inner radius) x (velocity of inner wind radius – velocity of outer wind radius)]^2 from outer radius to inner radius.

Why did I pick a formula to represent the culmination of my field work? Because a formula is incredibly short and sweet, but able to say so much. Also, when choosing to revise an index that is based on a certain formula, I would have to change the original formula to a new formula. Any other method of representing a revised ACE index would be complex or unwieldy. A formula is the perfect way of showing a culmination of my field work, by revealing the changes I believe need to occur in the ACE index.

Second Semester Bibliography

A list of new (or heavily used) sources from the second semester

Emanuel, K. A. (1989). The Finite Amplitude Nature of Tropical Cyclogenesis. Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, 3431-3456.

Emanuel, K. A. (2005). Increasing Destructiveness of Tropical Cyclones over the Past 30 Years. Nature, 686-688.

Evans, personal communication, April 7, 2010

H. Friedman, personal communication, April 14, 2010

J. Franklin, personal communication, April 7, 2010

K. Emanuel, personal communication, April 5, 2010

M. Bourassa, personal communication, April 6, 2010

M. Powell, personal communication, April 12, 2010

P. Klotzbach, personal communication, April 6, 2010

Powell, Mark D., Reinhold, Timothy A. (2007). Tropical Cyclone Destructive Potential by Integrated Kinetic Energy. Bulletin of the Atmospheric Sciences, 1-14.

S. D. Aberson, personal communication, April 7, 2010

S. Lorsolo, personal communication, April 7, 2010

S. Stewart, personal communication, April 7, 2010

Semester 1 - Guiding Questions

Main:
How do certain factors affect the ability for tropical systems to rapidly intensify, and does storm size, determined by the radius of hurricane and tropical storm force winds, have an effect on the potential tropical systems to rapidly intensify?


Secondary:
How do Hurricanes strengthen/function?

Why is hurricane intensity forecasting so difficult?

What are the atmospheric factors that influence hurricane intensity?

What are the oceanic factors that influence hurricane intensity?

What are the hurricane features that influence hurricane intensity?

Does storm size influence hurricane intensity?

Journal #15 - The Final Countdown: A Reflection

Huzzah! The process, the semester, all my work has been completed and is over. It’s a feeling of both relief and accomplishment, after an entire year of research, I feel like I’ve both thoroughly investigated a topic (hurricane intensity forecasting) and I have added something to the field. Reflecting back on this process, would I do anything differently? Perhaps I would tell prior me to do a more constant, steady stream of work as opposed to working in bursts over a semester. Is there anything I wish I had done more of? I wish I had contacted more experts in my first semester – I feel like just talking to people in the field would have been helpful in formulating my ideas. Yes, I had a great mentor, but I feel like talking to experts later in the year gave me a broad view of my subject. I really appreciate a lot of the comments I received on my paper from meteorologists – they were all incredibly supportive of my interest in meteorology. I also feel that this entire year gave me a year to really pursue my own interests, and do them independently. The course was rigorous because it was forced to be – I had to do all my own research, find all my articles, on my own time. Making my own schedule was a real independent experience for me. I feel I gained a lot of personal responsibility from this, completely outside of my new knowledge of hurricanes. What a great year.

Journal #14 - Hello? Is there anybody out there?

Here’s one of the biggest drawbacks about meteorology – there simply aren’t a lot of meteorologists. Only a few hundred students graduate with meteorology degrees each year, and even then, not all of these graduates go on to actually go into meteorology. Not to mention that the meteorologists that do work in weather forecasting tend to live in and around cities and universities (to either reach the greatest number or people or do research). Unfortunately, here in southwest Connecticut, we lack large cities (500,000+) and universities that study and do research in the atmospheric sciences and meteorology. This made for some great difficulties in finding a local expert to sit on my panel and evaluate my presentation. No school parents had any real involvement in meteorology, and the alumni office seemed to be lost to find anyone who was in meteorology. Even when I asked the science teachers, their contacts had no desire to participate on the panel – they were either too busy or didn’t feel like wasting their time. There are no meteorology universities near our area – the closest are Cornell (4 hours), MIT (3 hours), or Penn State (5 hours), and I doubt a researcher would be willing to drive all the way to see my small presentation. Most broadcast meteorologists are working or live in New York City – and are most likely too busy to participate on a panel. And the closest office for the National Weather Service is located in Upton, New York – a significant distance away, and most of the people working for the NWS would be working when my presentation is scheduled to be. Where does this leave me? Hopefully I’ll get lucky. Hopefully one person will be able to spend some time for my presentation.

Journal #13 – Exit Visa (get me out of this place)

Where things stand in my field work: done. I’ve developed a new formula for determining hurricane energy, which was my main goal of what I set out to do. The only possible thing I could do left for my field work would to be analyzing some test cases of storms – plugging in data and getting out a value. Articulating an original theory: done. As previously stated, my original formula for estimated the kinetic wind energy contained within a hurricane is a combination of prior knowledge gained in this area as well as contact with meteorologists.

Five key findings (in chronological order):
1) Yes, there is a general consensus among meteorologists that a new index for hurricane energy is needed, outside of Safir-Simpson or ACE

2) Because there was a general consensus for a new scale is needed, storm size was seen as an important factor to include in this new index (which fits into my research in the prior semester)

3) Taking storm size into account, I would have to figure out a way to find the energy of the wind across all points of the storm system; to do this, I would have to assume the hurricane is a perfect circle (rarely true) and that at a certain radius away from the center of the storm, the wind is the same speed (also rarely true).

4) How to find the total kinetic energy of a tropical cyclone, assuming linearly decreasing wind speed (the development of a formula).

5) Meteorology and forecasting is not perfect and will most likely never be perfect – we have to make assumptions and do the best we can to understand the natural world.

Theory: Because there is a need for a new hurricane energy index, I developed one taking into account storm size and wind speed at certain radii outside of the center, finding the total wind kinetic energy of a tropical cyclone.

Conclusion: I have finished all I have to do – maybe do a singular case study for my portfolio or presentation, but all of the important work is done. I’m very proud of my research and development.

Journal #12 – Possible uses of RACE

Now that I’ve developed an update to ACE, I’d like to mull over some of the possibilities for this formula. First and foremost, RACE will be used to calculate the accumulated cyclone energy for both storms and hurricane seasons, as ACE does in its current capacity. RACE would simply be a much more accurate measurement of the accumulated cyclone energy. However, the potential for RACE extends beyond a simple recalculation of what ACE was used for – RACE can be expanded to new areas of hurricane energy. One possible usage of RACE would be as a sort of corollary to the Safir-Simpson Scale – certain values of RACE would correlate to different categories of storm intensity. However, this scale would not be ranking storms merely on their maximum potential damage (as done by Safir-Simpson currently). Storms would be ranked on their overall damage potential – how much damage a cyclone could do over a wide enough area. Generally speaking, a larger cyclone will cause more damage than an equally strong small cyclone – there is larger area of ocean that is affected by the water, which leads to a greater storm surge; the increase wind field means that damage is caused over a larger land area; the larger storm size means more total water content and can lead to more flooding. In this way, RACE would be a helpful tool in determining the overall destructive power of a storm, which would be helpful in allocating resources or emergency services to affected areas, prior to a storm.

Journal #11 – Formula, part 2

Why is this formula an improvement over ACE and IKE? I believe that it gives a more accurate representation of overall hurricane intensity versus ACE. ACE is simply a measurement of the square of the maximum wind speed of a hurricane, no matter how large or how small a storm system is. It does not give an accurate reading of the overall energy of the storm – a storm with maximum winds of 100kts and a 34kt radius of 200 miles still has the same ACE as a storm with maximum winds of 100kts and a 34kt radius of 60 miles. It’s simply more accurate than ACE is when determining energy for a storm during its lifetime, or during a hurricane season. Now, while IKE is a more accurate measure of storm intensity (see http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/ike/Files/IntegratedEnergyPowell2.pdf for more information on IKE), it is significantly more difficult to calculate. My formula only requires four data points – 34kt wind radius, 50kt wind radius, 64kt wind radius, and maximum velocity, while IKE requires significantly more data points and would be significantly more difficult to calculate. My formula provides both an accurate representation of overall hurricane energy by taking into account storm size, yet allows for a method that is still simple enough to be easily usable. From now on, I wish to refer to my formula as RACE – revised accumulated cyclone energy. I believe that RACE deals with overall hurricane energy in a way that is both accurate and simple, making it an upgrade of the AC E formula.

Journal #10 – Operational vs. Research

Backtracking a little bit, I thought I’d write an entry on the differing opinions between meteorologists in the operational and research fields. In a few of my previous entries, I touched on the differences in opinions between meteorologists who are primarily involved in research versus those who are operational (the people who actually make predictions). In general, operational meteorologists are more interested in data having to do with actual storm forecasting and effects on people, while research meteorologists are more concerned with data quantifying types of weather. However, this generally only appears to be true with regards to tropical weather. In winter weather forecasting, there are nearly no ‘indexes’ – the only index for winter weather is the NESIS scale (NorthEast Snowfall Impact Scale), which quantifies snowstorms based on how many people affected by large amounts of snow. Not surprisingly, this scale was, created by a pair of operational meteorologists – Kocin and Uccellini – as it is not concerned with the overall extremity of a storm, but rather with its effect on the populace. In severe weather forecasting, the Fujita scale (for tornado intensity), which is based on the damage a tornado causes, was created by an operational meteorologist and a research meteorologist. In general, then, operational meteorologists use tools that connect the severity of weather events with regards to the populace these events effect. Research meteorologists (with such scales as ACE in tropical forecasting) who do not connect with people are no so concerned about weather’s effect on the populace.

Journal #9 - The Formula

Taking in to consideration all the responses I have received, I set out to create a formula for a hurricane energy index somewhere between ACE and IKE. Using four common data points of a tropical system (34kt wind radius, 50kt wind radius, 64kt wind radius, and maximum wind speed), I’ve developed a formula that takes into account both wind speed and storm size. One of the assumptions made in the creation of the formula was that winds increase in a linear fashion between wind radii – although this could be seen as simplistic, it is still accurate. The general form of the formula is as follows – the integral of (10^-4)*2pi*r*[(velocity of outer wind radius) x (outer radius – r)/(outer radius – inner radius) x (velocity of inner wind radius – velocity of outer wind radius)]^2 from outer radius to inner radius. In the formula, little r is the variable. The first part of the formula – the integral of 2pi*r – is the formula to find the area of a circle between any two radii. The second part of the formula (or, everything else) is the formula for determining the wind speed at any radius of the tropical cyclone. The wind speed is squared, as the formula for kinetic energy is ½ mv^2. In this formula mass and the coefficient ½ were not included because we are not interested in the actual kinetic energy of the cyclone – merely the amount of kinetic energy in the cyclone compared with other cyclones. Using this formula, you can find the entire kinetic energy of a cyclone based not only on the maximum wind speed, but also how far out the storm extends.

Journal #8 - Thoughts and Reflections

With a lack of consensus amongst the professionals, it’s tough to say with a definite answer as to who is right and who is wrong. However, after reviewing the e-mails I’ve received from these meteorologists, I’ve come to a few conclusions. First, the Saffir-Simpson scale, with regard to maximum wind speed, should not be abandoned. The scale is simple, works well at warning the public, and is too historically important to avoid. Any ideas of changing it would make the scale either too complex or unusable with regards to the nearly 150 years of prior data. However, there seems to be as well a bubbling for another idea or method of determining hurricane energy. While some meteorologists like ACE, it makes little sense to just ignore storm size with regards to the calculation of accumulated cyclone energy. The index that seems to be the leading candidate to replace ACE would be IKE, but the crucial problem with IKE is that it requires information on tropical systems that is only available for certain storms at certain times. It is unlikely that we will have enough information to implement IKE within the next twenty years, and even then we may not be able to use it to its fullest extent. Therefore, I am proposing a middle ground – somewhere between IKE and ACE, at least until IKE can be used fully. Wind radii should be used in calculating an accumulated energy index, in such a method. The area of wind from 35kts to 49kts, from 50kts to 64kts, and from 64kts to the max wind speed for each storm should be calculated, and then multiplied by the square of the average wind speed for each area (42kts, 57kts, and (maxkt + 64kts)/2) to get a basic general accumulated cyclone energy for each six hour period of a tropical system.

Journal #7 - And now, part two

With regards to ACE, meteorologists were more split than with regards to the Saffir-Simpson scale. The biggest split seemed to appear between operational meteorologists (those working for the NHC) and research meteorologists (those working at universities and the HRD). Among the operational meteorologists, Stewart sees no reason to change ACE as is. And Franklin believes ACE is pointless because it refuses to differentiate between “tropical cyclone activity and tropical cyclone activity that matters”, or, that ACE gives to much weight to long lasting storms than storms that have any actual affect on the populace. This opinion changes amongst the research meteorologists, however. Prof. Bourassa believes that IKE (Integrated Kinetic Energy) makes significantly more sense than ACE, and ignoring storm size makes no sense; however, he notes the lack of data available is a limitation on the usage of IKE. Prof. Emanuel thinks ACE is decent, however, he prefers to use a method of “power dissipation” – power dissipation is basically the same as ACE, except for in power dissipation, the max wind speed is cubed (as opposed to squared in ACE). Prof. Klotzbach said he would not make any changes to ACE and that he preferred it greatly to the power dissipation method (as, he said, the power dissipation method would have a tendency of magnifying small errors). Prof. Evans saw a need for an alternative index, although she was not sure exactly what kind of index was needed, and suggested I take a look at Mark Powell’s paper on IKE. Aberson, as well, forwarded me the paper on IKE by Powell.

Journal #6 - Will the consesus of forecasters please stand up?

So far, I've gotten 9 responses out of the 20 e-mails I've sent out - 2 of them referred me to other meteorologists who have, as of yet, not responded to me. But, in general, I received a very impressive response. Because of the two part question I’ve asked, I’m going to split my summarization of e-mails into two journal entries – one for ACE, and one for Saffir-Simpson. This entry will have to do with the Saffir-Simpson scale. In general, the response I received was that the meteorologists were against altering the Saffir-Simpson scale. Most of the meteorologists (Prof. Bourassa, Franklin, Prof. Klotzbach,
Prof. Evans, Stewart) all pointed out that the National Hurricane Center recently removed storm surge and pressure from the Saffir-Simpson scale, making the S-S scale simply about top wind speed. Prof. Bourassa stated that while he had a positive reaction towards the new S-S scale, he had not been able to investigate it fully and expressed doubts over the new solution with regards to storm surge. Prof. Emanuel said that he was not a supporter of the S-S scale in its current form, and would prefer to “would reform it by making the scale a strict function of the maximum wind speed over a threshold, raised to some power, allowing for two significant figures (e.g. cat 4.2) and leaving it open ended (e.g. cat 6.1)”. Franklin noted some attempts in recent years to redesign the hurricane scale, and that these attempts usually involved storm size; however, he notes that such scales would most likely only serve to confuse the public (his concern makes sense as a forecaster for the NHC). Prof. Klotzbach noted that the NHC had recently made changes to the S-S scale. Prof. Evans believes we should keep the S-S scale because we’ve been keeping records that way for over 100 years, and that the S-S scale acts as a sort of “comfort” for the public, however, she notes the need for an alternative index. Stewart believes that the S-S scale is fine as is. Aberson recommended I look at a measure entitled Integrated Kinetic Energy of a system as a possible method of using storm size.

Journal #5 - Where I Stand

So, where am I to go with my project? Well, so far, I seem to have gotten the impression from my e-mails (and from my personal thoughts beforehand) that ignoring storm size when trying to assess cyclone energy is a poor idea. However, the reason that storm size has been ignored in tropical cyclone energy calculations for so many years is not due to a lack of interest, but rather due to a lack of information. Usually, the only data available about hurricanes was the maximum wind speed. However, now that technologies are significantly more advanced, we are able to capture the wind radii of a tropical system to a somewhat accurate estimate. Because we are now collecting more data on hurricanes, it can be put to good use as a measure of overall cyclone intensity. The only thing holding us back is the old customs from a time when we had less data. What does this mean? I’m still on the same track I was before (so far). Nothing has changed my mind about the inclusion of storm size into Saffir-Simpson or ACE; everything has indicated that the inclusion of storm size would be beneficial in making the findings for Accumulated Cyclone Energy more accurate. The only remaining question is a how – what would be the best way to include storm size? Should only hurricane force wind radii be included? 50 knots? 34 knots? These are questions I will have to further investigate, and hopefully get some more answers on.

Journal #4 - E-mails!

So, I sent out my e-mails to various meteorologists in both academic and professional fields over the past week or so, and I’m beginning to get some replies back. Some of them are “sorry, can’t help you” with a subtle undertone of “I’m really much too busy to help you”, however, these e-mails usually included another name that the meteorologist suggested I contact (Professor Lindzen, from MIT, suggested I contact William Gray, from Colorado State University – I thanked him for his recommendation, even though I had already e-mailed Professor Gray). Another e-mail I received, from Mark Bourassa from Florida State University, gave me a quick overview of what I wanted to know, letting me know that his answers were short, but good. So far I’ve gotten a few of each e-mail, and these e-mails are going to help me in my quest to define my research for this second semester of my project. My goal is the once I collect more and more of these e-mails, I’ll have an idea of where I should go with my research project. I must say, however, it’s been incredibly reassuring to receive some e-mails, any e-mails at all. When I first sent them out, I was almost positive that I would get no response, or that the response I would get would minimal or unimportant. I have been pleasantly surprised that experts in the field of meteorology are willing to take a few minutes to respond to my question.

Journal #2 - Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Research

It's been a little while since I've updated. Here's where I currently stand.

I've finalized the field work proposal, and have a pretty good idea of what I want to do. My current thoughts are based around the idea of creating a new hurricane intensification index involving storm size - who better to ask about a new index than the experts themselves? My plan is to e-mail a couple dozen experts in the field of hurricane intensity, and ask them for their opinions on how they would make changes to hurricane intensity indexes such as ACE or the Saffir-Simpson scale, especially with regards to storm size. While taking their recommendations into account, I will begin my own research into the topic, beginning broadly at first and then quickly getting more specific as I get more responses. There's the possibility of visiting a few libraries and universities, but most information now is available, free of charge, on the internet. Finally, a few nights ago I reflected on why the goal of this research project is important. One of the reasons, besides accuracy, is that perhaps an introduction of storm size into hurricane intensity indexes, such as ACE, will give us a better understanding of the trends in hurricane power over time. Perhaps changing the index will reveal that hurricanes have had a noticeable, significant spike in overall intensity over the past 30 years, or maybe it will further conclude that there has been little change in overall hurricane intensity over the past few decades. The possibilities are exciting.

Field Work Proposal Up

See right side for the proposal.

Journal #2 to come later this evening.

First Ideas/Initial Proposal

Revising Hurricane Intensity Indexes

The intensity of tropical systems has long been determined simply by the maximum wind speed within a storm; both accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) and the Saffir-Simpson Scale only utilize maximum wind speed as a factor in their calculation. These scales both fail to take into account the wind radii of a tropical system, which can affect the area of damage, the storm surge caused by the system, and the overall power of the cyclone. The project aims to redefine and update the ACE index, and perhaps the Saffir-Simpson Scale (a secondary goal) to make wind speed radii a factor in determining cyclone energy.

The potential impact of this project is the creation of an index that would be more accurately classify hurricanes and hurricane seasons by not just maximum wind speed, but a more general measurement of storm intensity based on the size of the storm and size of the wind radii. It would be helpful in determining the overall intensity and impact of a storm to a much greater extent than our current systems of measurement allow. In the past 10 years, there has been a great push in the development of a system that would account for the overall strength of a system. In a paper by Power and Reinhold (2007), the pair of researchers describe all of the attempts to update hurricane intensity indexes, saying “Alternative measures to assess hurricane destructive potential include accumulated cyclone energy (ACE; Bell et al. 2000), hurricane outer- and inner-core strengths (Weatherford and Gray 1988; Croxford and Barnes 2002), roof cladding fatigue damage index (Mahendran 1998), turbulence kinetic energy dissipation (Businger and Businger 2001), power (Emanuel 2005), and hurricane intensity and hazard indices (Kantha 2006).” There seems to be a growing consensus in the scientific community that something is wrong with the current system – both that it is not an accurate portrayal of overall hurricane intensity, and that a system that goes by merely one characteristic can produce misleading results. The paper later goes on to say that “Most of these measures have limitations related to the lack of information on the spatial extent of damaging winds. For example ACE and power are computed from the square or cube of [maximum velocity] without considering storm structure.” An update to ACE would include the storm structure as well as the maximum velocity in consideration to measure overall storm intensity.

To collect the data, I would use the same data set I used for the second part of my paper, utilizing the wind radii for storms combined with the maximum wind speed. Similarly, there is a project by the Hurricane Research Department called “surface wind analysis”, which produces some beautiful maps and represents the radii of the wind speeds incredibly well. More information on the project can be found at - http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/data_sub/wind.html. Another possibility would be hand-drawn (or computer drawn) images of storms, as well as a reconstruction of past storms and hurricane seasons using my newly developed system.

Sources:

Powell, M. D., & Reinhold, T. (2007). Tropical Cyclone Destructive Potential by Integrated Potential Energy . American Meteorological Society , 513-526.

Papers mentioned by Powell and Reinhold, as well as a version of an updated ACE index, referenced next.

Jia-Yuh Yu, C. C.-G. (2009). A Revised Accumulated Cyclone Energy Index. Geophysical Research Letters .

Research Paper

My research paper is now posted - see the sidebar of the blog for a link to it.

Below is a quick abstract/summary of said paper.

Examining Rapidly Intensifying Hurricanes in the North Atlantic Basin

Abstract:
Hurricane forecasting, along with weather forecasting in general, has only begun to develop successful methods for the prediction of future weather events in the past 30 years through the introduction of GOES satellites and numerical weather models. However, when compared with the great advancements made in hurricane track forecasting, hurricane intensity forecasting has greatly lagged in improvement in the past twenty years, mostly due to the complexity of the interaction of the above features that control hurricane intensity. The factors that affect the ability for tropical systems to rapidly intensify can be pared down into three main categories: atmospheric conditions, oceanic thermodynamics, and inner core characteristics of the tropical system. Within each of these main categories, there are individual characteristics such as wind shear, sea surface temperatures, and eyewall structure, most of which have been extensively analyzed (however, they are not always well understood in real-world applications). One of the less examined factors, storm size, is analyzed in this paper and found to have a notable effect on the potential for tropical systems to rapidly intensify. The goal in analyzing storm size is to try and improve upon a Rapid Intensification Index (RII) developed by leading hurricane researchers, by discussing the plausibility of adding storm size as a possible factor in the potential for rapid intensification.

Introduction

Hello, all who have come to this blog!

A little background/introduction as to the point of this blog - as a senior in high school, I am taking a course my school offers that allows me to basically study whatever I'm interested in (yes, I actually have to do work for the class - such as writing a 20+ page research paper). My interests are in meteorology, and so this project was born. This blog is to keep up on my research during the second half of the school year - with regards to hurricane intensity and the revision of the ACE index to include storm size as a measure of hurricane intensity. Over the coming days I'll post a copy of my research paper and the beginnings of my thoughts for the next stage of my research.