Abstract
•Hurricane surface wind velocity has been evaluated using seven analytical models for different recent hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico.•The method suggested by Xie et al. (2006) was selected as the most appropriate method for calculating the radius of the maximum wind in hurricanes.•After calibrating the analytical models, the model proposed by Holland et al. (2010) showed the best results for simulating storm-induced wind velocity in the Gulf of Mexico.•Analytical models are valid up to a particular radius from the hurricane center, which was estimated for the Gulf of Mexico.
Different analytical models have been evaluated for estimating wind speed of the tropical storm, where the storm-induced wind velocity is calculated as a function of distance from the center of the hurricane. For these models, different parameters such as maximum wind speed, a radius of the maximum wind, hurricane shape parameter, hurricane translation speed and the orientation of the trajectory, etc., affect the shape of a hurricane. Hurricanes Lili (2002), Ivan (2004), Katrina (2005), Gustav (2008) and Ike (2008) from the Gulf of Mexico were used for skill assessment. The maximum wind radius was calculated using significant wind radii (R34, R50 and R64) reported by the National Hurricane Center. Different formulas for calculating the radius of maximum wind speed were evaluated. The asymmetric wind field for each hurricane was generated using analytic methods and compared with in situ data from buoys in the Gulf of Mexico and the H*Wind data. Analytical models were able to predict high wind speed under tropical cyclone conditions with relatively high precision. Among the analytical models evaluated in this research, the model proposed by Holland et al. (2010) showed excellent results. Dynamical wind models such as NCEP/NARR provide wind speed with the coarse spatial resolution which is acceptable for far-field locations away from the hurricane eye. In contrast, analytical models were able to produce sufficiently reliable wind speed within a particular radius from the center of the hurricane. Therefore blending of dynamical and analytical models can be used to provide accurate wind data during hurricane passage in the Gulf of Mexico.
Destructive hurricanes are passing over the Gulf of Mexico every few years. Early alarm systems require accurate wave, water level and current data along the coastline which are usually provided by sophisticated models. The wind structure of the hurricane is the main input for those models. This manuscript assesses and optimizes different formula describing recent hurricanes crossing the Gulf of Mexico. [Display omitted]
