Why the Hurricane Cone Overwhelms the Warning Messages and What to do About It

The cone of uncertainty has become the primary mechanism to communicate hurricane forecasts, which has become a big problem. Five or six days ahead of a possible landfall, the cone is the best mechanism we currently have to alert the public and key decision-makers that a storm is a potential threat and action might soon be required. Under the current tropical alerting system, ideally, the message derived from the cone should give way to specific watches and warnings and the detailed forecasts in those bulletins in the 36 to 60 hours before landfall.

During Hurricane Ian’s approach to the west Florida coast, based on post-storm comments by federal, state, and local public officials, the implied message derived from the cone was the main narrative that guided decision-making and public messaging even after critical warnings were issued, which included life-threatening storm-surge threat scenarios. This focus on the cone was especially problematic since the cone’s width narrows as the storm approaches the coast, so more and more of the impacts from a hurricane of average to large size occur outside the cone zone depicted on the graphic.

Deconflicting the message of the cone and that of the warnings is the challenge this talk will address. Clearly, the traditional rubric that more education is needed doesn’t apply because key decision-makers with access to every level of expert analysis still let the cone dominate their thinking. This talk will examine the issues and propose possible courses of action.