The sensors, housed in vented steel pipes a few inches wide and about a foot long, are designed to be rapidly installed on bridges, piers, and other structures that have a good chance of surviving a hurricane, and are part of the USGS Storm Tide Monitoring Network. Storm-tide sensors record water-level and wave data. The sensors gathered information used by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and by emergency managers to monitor the timing, extent and magnitude of storm tides. 5, technicians had deployed about a half-dozen sensors in coastal Virginia as the storm’s high water approached that state’s Tidewater region. 29 and 30 in Florida, then rolling along the coasts of Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina over the long Labor Day holiday weekend. Geological Survey hydrologists and hydrologic technicians deployed more than 350 storm-tide sensors, beginning Aug. 3 on a tidal creek in Onslow County, North Carolina. Ryan Rasmussen, USGS hydrologic technician, installs a storm tide sensor Sept. So USGS preparations for the hurricane adapted and expanded in response to changing forecasts from the National Hurricane Center. But the storm gave Puerto Rico a near miss, stalled over the Bahamas and then slowly moved up the Florida coast. Since Dorian, as a tropical storm, was expected to hit Puerto Rico Aug. Once a hurricane or tropical storm is considered likely to strike somewhere in the U.S., the team leaders decide whether it is necessary and safe to deploy USGS field crews to the storm’s projected path along the coast. The Storm Team closely follows the storm’s forecast intensity and track. The Coastal Storm Response Team, a multidisciplinary group of specialists from throughout the USGS, works closely with the National Hurricane Center and other federal agencies and confers daily when forecasters indicate a hurricane or tropical storm is likely to make landfall in the U.S. This is how the USGS’ continuing response to Hurricane Dorian has progressed:īefore a coastal storm is predicted to make landfall, the USGS begins collecting data that can improve forecasting, guide relief work, and speed up recovery from the powerful storms’ effects. This included the ability to forecast coastal change track storm tides, river and stream levels and flow measure coastal and inland flooding across entire regions capture high-resolution ground elevation and topographic data and create detailed maps used by disaster teams responding in the aftermath of storms. During Dorian’s nearly two-week passage from the Caribbean to Canada, the USGS provided the public and emergency managers with comprehensive scientific capabilities and information. The scientific assessments already beginning can help decision makers, emergency responders and communities recover from the effects of Hurricane Dorian and prepare for future storms. Research oceanographers are examining photographic evidence of storm-caused coastal erosion. Field crews are recovering the more than 350 scientific instruments that documented storm-tides triggered by the hurricane, and are processing the instruments’ recorded data. After a rapid response to Hurricane Dorian that involved scientists from multiple science centers in five states, the USGS is beginning to gather and analyze the evidence of storm tides and coastal erosion left behind by the hurricane.
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