A Brief History of and Future Vision for the Use of Model Guidance for National Hurricane Center Forecast Products

Development of objective tropical cyclone forecast guidance began shortly after the National Hurricane Center started issuing quantitative forecasts of the 24-hour position of tropical cyclones in 1954. The early models used simple empirical relationships between storm properties, such as initial position and motion, to predict the future positions. Over the next six decades, much more sophisticated models were implemented, and the majority of the improvements in NHC’s official track forecasts during this time can be attributed to improvements in available model guidance. This paper provides a brief review of tropical cyclone models used by NHC and their evolution from statistical and statistical-dynamical to dynamical systems.

NHC also recognized the need to convey uncertainty information with their forecasts, and has done so for more than 30 years. The Hurricane Strike Probability products first became available with Hurricane Alicia in 1983, and this product provided track forecast uncertainty information using a statistical approach. Model guidance on forecast uncertainty is expected to follow a path similar to that for the deterministic model predictions, where statistical approaches will transition to dynamical model ensemble systems. At the present time, however, statistical models based on the past history of NHC’s forecast errors are still the primary driver of NHC’s forecast uncertainty products, including those for wind and storm surge hazards. This paper will provide a vision for the future, where coupled ocean-atmosphere modeling systems can be used as guidance for NHC’s deterministic and probabilistic forecast and warning products. The future role of the forecaster in that process will also be discussed.