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The Hurricane Modification Project: Past Results and Future Prospects

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The Hurricane Modification Project: Past Results and Future Prospects View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University The Space Congress® Proceedings 1970 (7th) Technology Today and Tomorrow Apr 1st, 8:00 AM The Hurricane Modification Project: Past Results and Future Prospects R. C. Gentry DI rector, Project STORMFURY, National Hurricane Research Laboratory, Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratories, ESSA Research Laboratories Miami, Florida Follow this and additional works at: https://commons.erau.edu/space-congress-proceedings Scholarly Commons Citation Gentry, R. C., "The Hurricane Modification Project: Past Results and Future Prospects" (1970). The Space Congress® Proceedings. 3. https://commons.erau.edu/space-congress-proceedings/proceedings-1970-7th/session-11/3 This Event is brought to you for free and open access by the Conferences at Scholarly Commons. It has been accepted for inclusion in The Space Congress® Proceedings by an authorized administrator of Scholarly Commons. For more information, please contact [email protected]. THE HURRICANE MODIFICATION PROJECT: PAST RESULTS AND FUTURE PROSPECTS Dr. R. Cecil Gentry DI rector, Project STORMFURY National Hurricane Research Laboratory Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratories ESSA Research Laboratories Miami, Florida ABSTRACT Modification experiments on Hurricane Debble on 18 iodide generators were developed by St. Amand and and 20 August 1969 were conducted by Project his group before the 1969 hurricane season. The STORMFURY, a cooperative effort of the Departments frustration of waiting 4 years without opportuni­ of Defense and Commerce. The hurricane decreased ties for experimentation May not, therefore, have in intensity following the "seedings" on each of been in vain. The succession of apparently Minor the days. This paper summarizes the history of changes to improve the design of the seeding ex­ the Project, discusses the STORMFURY hypotheses, periment may have Made the difference between describes the experiment, reports the results, success or failure for the Debbie experiMents. analyses their significance and outlines future plans of the Project. Two general considerations justify Project STORM- FURY experiments: I) recent Improvements in our understanding of the physical processes fundaMtn- INTRODUCTION tal to the maintenance of hurricanes suggest good avenues of experimentation, and 2) enorMOus rewards Results from Hurricane Debbie modification experi­ can be derived from even a siIght degree of bene­ ments on lb and 20 August 1969 are so encouraging ficial Modification. The first will be elaborated as to offer hope that man may one day exert a In later sections; the second may be illustrated degree of control over the intensity of these dev­ by the following rough "cost-benefit" analysis. astating storms that originate over the tropical oceans. The experiments were conducted by Project Hurricanes caused an average annual danage In the STORMFURY, an interdepartmental effort of Defense United States of 13 Million dollars between 1915 (Navy) and Commerce (ESSA) (1). The Air Force has and 1924. By the period I960 to 1969, this figure also been a very active participant and signifi­ had jumped to 432 Million dollars. Even after cant contributions have been made by the NSF, NASA, adjusting these values for the inflated cost of and FAA, as well as several university groups. construction in recent years, this represents a 650 percent increase In the average annual cost of R. H. Simpson proposed in 1961 that hurricanes hurricane damage In less than 50 years (3). Since might be modified by introducing freezing nuclei Americans continue to construct valuable buildings into the massive clouds surrounding the center of In areas exposed to hurricanes, these damage costs a hurricane. At about the same time Pierre St. should continue to increase. Hurricane Betsy of Amand and his associates at the Navy Weapons 1965 and Hurricane Carol lie of 1969 each caused Center, China Lake, California, developed pyro­ more than 1 A billion dollars in damage. If the technic generators which made it practical to in­ United States continues supporting hurricane modi­ troduce very large quantities of silver iodide fication research at the present rate for the next into clouds within a few minutes. Groups from the 10 years and if by that time we modify just one Weather Bureau and the Navy experimented on Hurri­ severe hurricane, such as Betsy, sufficiently to cane Esther with a single seeding on each of 2 reduce its damage by only 10 percent, the nation days in September 1961. Project STORMFURY was will have a 1000 percent return on its investment. formally organized in 1962 with R. H. Simpson as The benefits in terms of prevention of human suf­ the first director. In August 1963, the experi­ fering are, of course, Incalculable. ment with a single seeding per day was repeated on each of 2 days for Hurricane Beulah. The results At least two fundamentals established In recent of these earlier experiments have been reported by years by studies of hurricane structure and main­ Simpson and Malkus (2) and were encouraging but tenance suggest avenues for beneficial Modifica­ inconclusive. A multiple seeding experiment was tion: 1) an Internal energy source is necessary designed under the leadership of Joanne Simpson, If a hurricane Is to reach or retain even Moderate director of the project for 1965-66. During the intensity; this source is the sensible and latent years 1965-68 no hurricane occurred In a place heat transferred froM the sea surface to the air suitable for experimentation. Research on hurri­ inside the storm, and 2) the energy for the entire canes, both theoretical and experimental, contin­ synoptic-scale hurricane Is released by moist con­ ued, however, with results that led to changes in vection in highly organized convective scale cir­ the original design of the multiple seeding exper­ culations located primarily in the eyewall and iment. Furthermore, improved pyrotechnic silver major rain bands. In the first, we find an 11-19 explanation of the observations that hurricanes interaction and the transfer of energy by cumulus form only over warm tropical waters and begin convection. They cannot predict the effects on dissipating soon after moving over either cool storm motion of artificial intervention. They do, water or land; neither of which provides a flux of however, simulate many features of a hurricane energy to the atmosphere sufficient to keep the quite wel1. storm at full intensity. In the second, we find a more rational explanation of the low percentage of We have used the model developed by S. L. Rosen- tropical disturbances that become hurricanes. If thal (6) to get indications of where to release a warm sea with its large reservoir of energy were the heat by seeding the supercooled clouds with the only requirements, we would have 5 to 10 times freezing nuclei (silver iodide). We also asked as many hurricanes as normally form. During the what effect the seeding might have on the inten­ 1967 and 1968 hurricane seasons, 130 tropical sity of the hurricane. The answer of the first waves were tracked in the Atlantic and adjacent question is to release the heat just outside the areas where sea surface temperatures were warm mass of relatively warm air concentrated In and enough for hurricane genesis, but only 13 of the around the core of the hurricane. Specifically, areas developed storms of full hurricane intensity the best chances for reducing the maximum inten­ (4). If, however, there are only a limited number sity of the hurricane is to seed from the core of of ways in which the convective and synoptic the belt of maximum winds outwards along a radius. scales of motion can interact to achieve optimum The model suggests that this can result in a re­ utilization of the energy flowing upward from the duction of maximum winds in the hurricane by about ocean, then it is not surprising that few tropical 15 percent. disturbances intensify and become hurricanes. THE MODIFICATION EXPERIMENT THEORY OF MODIFICATION The modification experiment, therefore, seeks to Both of the above findings suggest possible field exploit energy sources within the hurricane. experiments which may beneficially modify a hurri­ Hurricane clouds contain large quantities of water cane. On the basis of the first, we may attempt substance still in the liquid state at tempera­ to reduce the flux of energy from the sea surface tures lower than -VC (fig. 1). Introduction of to the atmosphere, probably through attempts to silver iodide nuclei at these and lower tempera­ inhibit evaporation. On the basis of the second, tures should cause the water droplets to change to we may try to modify the release of latent heat in ice crystals and release the latent heat of fusion, the small portion (1 to 5 percent) of the total thus providing a possible mechanism for adding storm occupied by the organized active convective- heat to the hurricane. One objective of the scale motions in a manner that redistributes heat­ STORMFURY experiments is to verify the indications ing to produce a weakening of the storm. from the numerical model that heat should be re­ leased at the outer edge of the mass of warm air We do not know of any practical means of reducing occupying the central portion of the hurricane in the flux of energy from the sea surface to the order to cause a reduction in the storm's inten­ atmosphere in the area of gale and hurricane force sity. The experiments on Hurricane Debbie were winds. designed to determine if addition of heat in this area would result in diminishing the maximum hor­ We do have a means of modifying the rate of re­ izontal temperature gradients In the storm and, lease of latent heat in the clouds of the hurri­ eventually, In weakening the maximum winds of the cane.
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