The Weather and Research Forecast Model (WRF) is a new mesoscale model under development by a number of agencies involved in environmental prediction and atmospheric research. The model is fully compressible and can simulate dynamics from the cloud scale to the synoptic scale. At present, a limited number of microphysics, cumulus, and boundary layer parameterizations may be used to simulate sub-grid scale processes. WRF can be run with both idealized data or data from global forecast models as initial and boundary conditions. Further nesting is not yet available.

For operational hurricane forecasting, NOAA/NCEP is considering the replacement of the GFDL Hurricane Prediction System with WRF sometime in the next 5-10 years. We will present simulations of tropical cyclones in the WRF and GFDL models, for both idealized and real data cases. For an idealized tropical storm in an unsheared easterly flow, the two models produce similar tracks with significantly different intensification rates. For recent Atlantic hurricanes, such as Humberto (2001) and Michelle (2001), the WRF model shows moderate skill in both track and intensity, even with only a limited domain size and a straightforward application of the presently available physics parameterizations.