Creating Storm Tide Inundation Guidance and Bridging the Bering Strait with the NWS's ETSS Model

The National Weather Service's (NWS) Meteorological Development Laboratory (MDL) developed the Extra-Tropical Storm Surge (ETSS) model in 1995 by applying the Sea Lake and Overland Surges from Hurricanes (SLOSH) model to Extra-Tropical storms. Over the last two years, MDL, with Hurricane Sandy Supplemental funding, has been enhancing the ETSS model to meet anticipated requirements for a potential extra-tropical storm surge watch. The latest such enhancement implemented in September 2015, enabled ETSS to provide inundation guidance based on storm surge and tide in all of its model domains.

Also in September 2015, MDL addressed the fact that water couldn't flow through the Bering Strait due to having separate model domains. This was a significant failing in the accuracy of guidance in the Bering, Beaufort and Chukchi (BBC) seas and was resolved by creating a single large BBC basin.

This paper will describe the details of both efforts and evaluate the resulting upgrade with case studies of historical events both with and without these enhancements.