Office of Coast Survey Using Partnerships to Improve NOAA’s Storm Surge Products and Forecasts Jesse C. Feyen Storm Surge Roadmap Portfolio Manager National Ocean Service/Office of Coast Survey/Coast Survey Development Laboratory

Office of Coast Survey NOAA’s Coastal Flood Mission Supports wide range of activities –Long-term coastal management –Emergency management and evacuation planning –Forecast of imminent events Requires broad set of expertise –Meteorology, oceanography, geodesy, remote sensing, observing, modeling, computing, mapping & GIS, social science, outreach… Employing NOAA-wide effort in close partnership with external sectors

Office of Coast Survey NOAA’s Storm Surge Roadmap 10 year agency-wide plan to improve modeling, products and services Provides a common direction across the agency and to partners Adoption of technology that best fits NOAA’s specific requirements Bottom line: first comprehensive strategy to holistically address needs and establish a community approach

Office of Coast Survey NOAA’s Paradigm for Transitioning Research to Operations (R2O) Development and transition agents: e.g., MDL, CSDL, EMC, OHD, GFDL Partners: Academia, fed agencies, private industry, associations O & M centers: e.g., NCEP Central Operations, CO-OPS, River Forecast Centers, National Hurricane Center Forecast centers: e.g., WFOs, RFCs, NHC, CPHC Forecast Guidance Products and services

Office of Coast Survey NOAA’s Requirements Inundation predictions should… –Be timely and robust –Be accurate and high resolution –Consider uncertainties via probabilities and/or ensembles –Be readily available within operational frameworks Decision makers need… –Clear and simple messages –Consistent information that reinforces a common story

Office of Coast Survey Modernizing NOAA’s Surge System Improvements to surge modeling by… –Enhancing national operational system to meet users’ needs –Using community-based modeling frameworks to transition of research to operations Improving usability of forecast products –Adopting common datums and describing flooding above ground level –Using social science to evaluate prototype inundation graphics that will clearly communicate flood threat

Office of Coast Survey Surge Model Development Efforts Moving toward total water level modeling –Adding tides to operational model SLOSH Supports critical probabilistic inundation predictions –Implementing ADCIRC extratropical surge+tide model Accelerating transition of research to operations –IOOS testbed for evaluating costs and benefits of transitioning community models to operations –Investigating ensemble approaches, which could support use of multiple surge models

Office of Coast Survey Atlantic Extratropical Surge and Tide Operational Forecast System (ESTOFS) Applies research-based ADCIRC model – Enables future development Combines tide and surge Will be coupled to operational model WAVEWATCH III® Output in NetCDF and GRIB2 delivered on NCEP OPeNDAP server NOMADS

Office of Coast Survey Tropical and extratropical storms Consistent evaluation of community-based models –ADCIRC, SELFE, FVCOM, SLOSH –Drives development/ enhancement Answers questions about costs/benefits of transition to operations IOOS Inundation Testbed Component Gulf of Maine / Scituate Harbor - Extratropical Domain

Office of Coast Survey