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News
Join Dowling College In Discussing Hurricane Hazards in the U.S. -
A Re-Appraisal Based on Recent Research
In conjunction with Dowling College's Annual Theme of Globalism: One World, Nicholas K. Coch from the School of Earth and Environmental Sciences at Queens College of C.U.N.Y. will be discussing a hurricane hazards in the United States. The event will take place on Thursday, April 17, 2008 from 2:30p.m. - 4:30p.m. in the Fortunoff Hall Hunt Room at the Rudolph Campus in Oakdale.
Hurricanes are a major seasonal hazard along the U.S. Atlantic and Gulf Coasts. Research has shown that the nature and destructive potential of hurricanes in the Gulf, South Atlantic and North Atlantic Regions are very different. This has not been fully appreciated by the Insurance Industry. Gulf Hurricanes can intensify quickly if they pass over the deep and hot waters of the Loop Current (Hurricanes Katrina and Rita). Northern Hurricanes move faster, and their wind fields enlarge, as they move north of the Carolinas and are driven by upper-level westerly winds. Only hurricanes south of the Carolinas have "typical" development and destruction patterns.
The insurance industry, along with many emergency management officials, continue to predict hurricane destruction based almost entirely on the Saffir Simpson Category of a storm. This approach ignores significant destruction amplification factors, such as antecedent rainfall, population, structure density, mitigation levels, tidal stage at landfall, translational velocity, track relative to the coast, coastal geography, geology and topography, slope of the adjacent continental shelf, ocean basin, and coastal population and structure density. Hurricane destruction is not a function of the vortex winds alone. For example, a Category 2 Hurricane making a landfall in the New York - New Jersey Metropolitan Region will have the destructive effect of a Category 3 (or higher) Hurricane in the South, based on the historical record.
Only one hurricane in U.S. History resulted in regional (6 states) destruction and that was the Long Island - New England Hurricane of September 21, 1938. Recall that all recent major hurricanes (Andrew, Hugo, Opal, Katrina, Rita etc.), made landfalls on rural, vacation or suburban coastal areas. With the exception of the 1938 Hurricane, no metropolitan coastal center, with populations on the millions, has ever been hit by a major coast-normal tracking hurricane. So far we have been very lucky. Eventually there will be a major hurricane landfall in a coastal metropolitan area such as Boston, New York, Baltimore, Hampton Roads, Miami, Tampa Bay or Houston. The unique vulnerability of these urban centers will cause major economic loss based on recent studies.
Knowledge is the first step in effective damage mitigation. The Insurance Industry must develop a more realistic hurricane damage prediction model before the inevitable major hurricane directly hits one of our major urban centers. Immediate attention to the damage amplification factors described above, in addition to the Saffir-Simpson Category, will reduce potentially catastrophic losses for the insurance industry and increase preparedness for hurricanes in the future, Increased coastal development, global warming, sea level rise and increase in multidecadal hurricane frequency, must be acknowledged and acted upon by the Insurance Industry before disaster strikes.
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About Dowling College
Dowling College is an independent, coeducational college that serves more than 6,500 students at
its historic Rudolph Campus on the banks of the Connetquot River in Oakdale, NY, and the 105-acre
Brookhaven Campus in eastern Long Island and a business center located near the Nassau-Suffolk
border in Melville. Dowling offers Bachelor′s, Master′s, and Doctoral degrees in several
disciplines through its four schools: Arts and Sciences, Aviation, Business, and Education.
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