The Hurricane Forecast Improvement Project: Recent Operational Implementations

The Hurricane Forecast Improvement Program (HFIP) has goals to reduce the error in track and intensity forecast guidance from numerical model systems by 20% in five years (by 2014) and 50% in 10 years. Additional goals include skillful 7 day forecasts and a greatly increased ability to forecast rapid intensification and decay. For the last four years HFIP has been evaluating a number of approaches to reach this goal including advanced data assimilation for operational systems including high resolution global (~20-30 km) and regional (~1-4 km) models run as ensembles, and advanced statistical post processing of model output. Significant advances in track skill have been demonstrated through the use of Hybrid Data Assimilation and in intensity skill from improved regional models and the inclusion of high resolution data in the near vicinity of the hurricane. This talk will outline the HFIP and present the most recent results particularly from those components that have gone into operations in the last year and the impact those changes have had on operational model skill.