An Assessment of a high fidelity hurricane storm surge model for recent storm events

The ADCIRC model has been used for a number of applications, including storm surge hindcast studies, real-time flood predictions, and the study of interactions between various coastal processes. The model has been validated extensively, but often using high resolution meshes developed for specific regions and select storms. High fidelity models require vast computational resources and often prohibitive simulation time. There is a need for a larger scale computational grid with lower resolution that makes applications such as real time forecasting, risk analysis, and ensemble forecasting possible. In this study, we hindcast hurricanes that traversed the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Basin in recent decades using the ADvanced CIRCulation (ADCIRC) model with the Hurricane Surge On-demand Forecast System (HSOFS) grid to better understand general uncertainties in the model in an effort to be able to generate better, more meaningful forecasts for the general public. The hurricanes in the recent years were characteristically slow-moving and intense, resulting in increasingly devastating storm surges along the coast. Identifying uncertainties is a requisite step in improving the storm surge model, which can help facilitate better understanding of coastal related hazards.