Hurricane Research

2011 FSU COAPS Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast

FSU COAPS Atlantic Hurricane Season Forecast Archive

COAPS Hurricane Experts

Related COAPS Publications

COAPS Hurricane Experts

Bourassa's expertise is in the transfer of energy and momentum between the ocean and the atmosphere and remote sensing, particularly of surface winds. He also is interested in surface water waves and the identification of tropical disturbances, possible precursors to tropical cyclones. Recent work has involved remotely sensed estimates of the energy released in storms, as water vapor is converted to precipitation.

Dukhovskoy’s research interests focus on numerical modeling of ocean physical processes including ocean dynamics, storm surges, air-sea interaction, waves, and tides. He has been involved in different research efforts that studied ocean response to tropical storms. Currently, he is developing a storm surge model for the U.S. Gulf Coast as part of a project on flood risk assessment in the Gulf of Mexico.

LaRow and his colleagues at COAPS use a numerical climate model developed at FSU to understand seasonal predictability of hurricane activity. The model is one of only a handful of numerical models in the world being used to study seasonal hurricane activity. Numerical models use high performance computers to synthesize massive amounts of information, including atmospheric, ocean and land data.

Morey's research focuses on studying physical processes and circulation within the Gulf of Mexico. He conducts studies of estuarine systems and their connectivity to the offshore environment, the ocean response to hurricanes and deepwater processes over steep topography. He is currently working with a team at COAPS developing computer models of storm surge and coastal flooding.

An internationally known expert on El Niño and related weather phenomena, O'Brien also is the past state climatologist of Florida. He believes that global climate change is not causing an increase in the intensity or number of hurricanes, and he can discuss the influence of climate variability on hurricanes. O'Brien also can explain why the presence of La Niña may mean an especially active 2011 hurricane season and an increased likelihood that some will make landfall in the United States.

Powell investigates metrics for hurricane impacts and forecasts model performance based on integrated kinetic energy; real-time and retrospective observation-based analysis of the hurricane surface wind field; surface roughness and drag coefficient behavior in tropical cyclones based on analysis of GPS dropsonde measurements; and hurricane wind risk modeling (e.g. The Florida Public Hurricane Loss Model).

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