Dear Tom,
How do forecasters have the ability to track and pinpoint where a hurricane will make landfall days ahead of time?
Alan Giertych Frankfort, Ill.
Dear Alan,
Forecasters at the Tropical Prediction Center would be pleased if the premise of your question was true. While skill in hurricane forecasting has improved dramatically, there’s still much room for improvement.
Forecasters use a variety of tools, relying heavily on satellite tracking, computer models, upper air patterns, sea-surface temperature and climatology, just to name a few. Still, it is not uncommon for track accuracy to be off by hundreds of miles on a three to five day forecast. Forecasting storm intensification or weakening is another daunting task. This makes the expensive decision to evacuate a metropolitan area days ahead of a storm’s expected arrival a difficult task for government officials.
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Tom Skilling is chief meteorologist at WGN-TV. His forecasts can be seen Monday through Friday on WGN-TV News at noon and 9 p.m.
Write to: ASK TOM WHY, 2501 Bradley Pl., Chicago, IL 60618 or asktomwhy@wgntv.com (Mail volume precludes personal response.)
WGN-TV meteorologists Steve Kahn, Richard Koeneman and Paul Dailey plus weather producer Bill Snyder contribute to this page.
