Forecasting Coastal Impacts from Tropical Cyclones along the US East and Gulf Coasts using the ADCIRC Prediction System

To enhance the forecasting of wave, surge sediment transport (erosion and accretion above and below mean sea level), structure interaction and damage, we propose to heavily leverage our existing forecasting capability and experience operating the ADCIRC Prediction System (APS). We will enhance the current APS for surge, wave and inundation calculations, interface APS with the XBeach model to better represent nearshore and cross-shore wave processes and accompanying inundation and to predict sediment transport associated with the storm events. Wave and water level information from both APS and from XBeach will then be used to predict structure interaction and damage. Our efforts will focus on implementation and evaluation of our modeling system for hindcast events and/or for reanalysis of forecast events. Then we will utilize meteorological forcing to produce a daily forecast of coastal impacts beginning five days prior to landfall for at least three named hurricanes per year. These runs will be deterministic, commensurate with our approach to forecasting surge, wave and inundation from tropical cyclones in the APS. Given this experience, we are confident we will meet the forecast objectives of the NOPP community approach to model evaluation and improvement.

RA Luettich, MV Bilskie, BO Blanton, Z Cobell, DT Cox, JC Dietrich, JG Fleming, I Ginis. “Forecasting Coastal Impacts from Tropical Cyclones along the US East and Gulf Coasts using the ADCIRC Prediction System.” Department of Defense, Office of Naval Research, National Oceanographic Partnership Program (NOPP), Predicting Hurricane Coastal Impacts FY21-24, 2021/04/06 to 2025/04/05, $1,400,000 (Dietrich: $295,000).