Chuck Bednar for redOrbit.com – @BednarChuck
Anybody who has ever seen images of the devastation caused by Katrina, and especially people who have experienced such catastrophic events first-hand, know the force with which a hurricane is capable of striking. But what causes ordinary storms to become so powerful?
That’s what experts at the University of Miami’s Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science are trying to find out with their new laboratory, called the Surge-Structure-Atmosphere Interaction (SUSTAIN) facility. There, scientists are studying the physics and the dynamics of hurricanes that make landfall, as well as aspects of these catastrophic coastal storms.
Indoor storms
According to the Associated Press, the facility contains a 75-foot-long, 6.5-foot-high acrylic tank that is capable of holding 38,000 gallons of water. In the tank, this water is agitated using a 1,700 horsepower fan capable of creating simulated Category 5 hurricane conditions and winds of up to 157 miles per hour. Sensors mounted on the ceiling monitor atmospheric changes in the lab.
“SUSTAIN addresses a significant gap in the existing research infrastructure available to support the development of disaster resistant and resilient coastal communities,” the university explained on its website, adding that the lab “provides an innovative experimental test-bed” to evaluate the development of “high-resolution coupled wind-wave-surge forecast models” and “computational fluid dynamics models for hurricane impacts on coastal structures.”
Working to improve forecasts
In the laboratory, Rosenstiel School scientists study the impact caused by the severe wind-driven and wave-induced storm surges typically generated by hurricanes can have on coastal cities and other structures. SUSTAIN’s experiments feature hurricane force winds paired with wind-waves and storm surges combine to create a complex model of coastal topography.
The sensors used to monitor the experiments, lab director Brian Haus told the AP, will gather data to help fine-tune satellites used to monitor actual hurricanes. Such probes, he said, are typically sensitive to small things on the surface, and even though they have to cover big areas, experts aren’t certain what they actually see during extreme weather events.
Haus and his SUSTAIN colleagues also hope that they can enhance the quality of weather-focused observational equipment, the wire service said. Rick Knabb, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, told the AP that the research will play a key role in improving storm intensity forecasts, particularly near the coastline.
—–
Follow redOrbit on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Instagram and Pinterest.
Comments