The 2017 Atlantic hurricane season saw three devastating major hurricanes (Harvey, Irma, and Maria) make landfall and had meteorologists in Miami at the National Hurricane Center (NHC) working day and night. Like any team after a release that reviews their products to see how they can improve, the NHC found ways to enhance communication to the public regarding where a tropical storm is headed and the potential impact.
The 2018 Atlantic hurricane season starts June 1, and the Pacific hurricane season starts May 15. Here are some of the 2018 forecasting changes from the National Hurricane Center.
Massive Supercomputer Upgrade
To make complex calculations faster, enabling improved weather models and forecast monitoring ranging from hurricanes to blizzards, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) expanded its weather and climate supercomputing system for 2018, adding two Dell systems to NOAA's IBM and Cray computers at data centers in Reston, Virginia, and Orlando, Florida. With the ability to process 8 quadrillion calculations per second, NOAA’s supercomputing system is among the 30 fastest in the world.
Is Your Disaster Plan Ready?
Potential hazards include not only floods, hurricanes, and tornadoes, but power outages, technology failures, widespread illnesses, and, unfortunately, human-caused hazards including accidents and acts of violence.
62 percent of businesses have no disaster plan in place, and 40 percent never recover after a disaster, according to FEMA. For planning preparedness for your business, visit www.ready.gov/business.
Download the FEMA app for free on the App Store and Google Play and receive alerts from the National Weather Service.