Analysis of Flood Events, Watches, and Warnings in Tropical Cyclones Impacting the US

Tropical Cyclones striking land are often excessive precipitation events for long durations in the affected areas.  This can results in large flooding events along the path of the storm as it moves over land.  This research sheds more light on flooding events caused by tropical cyclones making landfall in the continental US.  The tools available in GIS help take a closer look at this events spatially.  Instances of flooding events from the NCEI storm events database are compared with the watches, warnings, and overall rainfall area of the cyclone.  The temporal aspect is also examined.  This is done by using the corresponding data with 6 hourly center positions of the storm from IBTrACS.  The overall analysis can show the distribution of flooding events around the storm and if a watch or warning would have been issued.  The addition of the temporal aspect helps show how far in advance an area would be aware of a large scale flooding event before it occurs.  This will be furthered by Stage IV rainfall data.  Focus will also be given to the events location in comparison to the center of the cyclone at the time of event.  The study primarily focuses on the 2004 and 2005 seasons as they were active and produce plenty of cases for examination.  This research can further what is known about forecasting flooding for tropical cyclones.