May 28, 2024 • 20 mins
As the 2024 hurricane season approaches again, climate experts across the United States are predicting an especially active season, driven largely by higher-than-average sea surface temperatures. This makes ever more important the research and planning that begins long before extreme weather strikes, and continues long after the storm has passed.
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Episode Transcript
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Bernie Fette (00:14):
Hey everyone.
Welcome to ThinkingTransportation -- conversations
about how we get ourselves andthe stuff we need from one
place to another. I'm BernieFette with the Texas A&M
Transportation Institute.
Hurricane season is upon usonce again, and climate experts
across the U.S. are predictingan especially active period
(00:37):
from June through November,driven largely by
higher-than-average sea surfacetemperatures. With more storms
than ever expected to reachhurricane intensity, the need
for careful and effectiveplanning for storm response has
never been more urgent. Withthat in mind, we are
rebroadcasting a previousepisode on this topic,
(00:59):
featuring David Bierling, aresearch scientist at TTI and
an expert in the field of massevacuations of areas affected
by weather disasters. Thank youfor joining us, David.
David Bierling (01:12):
Thank you for having me, Bernie.
Bernie Fette (01:14):
Before we consider the hurricane season
that just started and the workthat you're doing, let's talk a
little bit about hurricanehistory, if we could,
particularly in Texas. Can yougive us a quick review?
David Bierling (01:28):
You know, hurricane season just started
here on June 1, and it runs upinto November. But that being
said, there's definitely peaksin the season about a quarter
of the tropical cyclones thataffect Texas in some way or
another. And this is notnecessarily even getting to a
hurricane level storm. We canhave a tropical storm like
(01:48):
Allison that has a majorimpact. Of course, a tropical
storm Allison came in earlyJune, 2001, dropped a lot of
rain in southeast Texas andreally screwed things up. So
we've got about a quarter ofthe storms that impact Texas in
July and June, and aboutanother 60 percent impact Texas
in August and September withmost of that impact coming in
(02:10):
September.
Bernie Fette (02:11):
And that's a pattern that typically follows
from year to year or season toseason.
David Bierling (02:15):
The short answer, Bernie, is yes, that's
a typical pattern that tends tohold out. Hurricane season runs
from June through November.
Bernie Fette (02:22):
It's helpful for us to understand that pattern.
And it sounds like that thatpattern typically, or generally
speaking, follows from year toyear , from season to season .
Considering that history again,are there any ways that
tropical storms, hurricanes,and other storms have changed
over that time?
David Bierling (02:43):
Well, climate researchers are seeing evidence
that storms seem to beintensifying over time. So if
you look at some of theresearch that the folks at NOAA
put out and other researchers,they're saying that given
changes in climate, we canexpect to see more intense
tropical cyclones.
Bernie Fette (03:04):
Okay. And that quick review brings us up to
now, and most of thepredictions that people can
find online about the 2022tropical storm season say that
it's going to be a more activethan usual few months, more
storms that will be intenseenough to earn a name and of
those more that will reachhurricane intensity. Right? So
(03:29):
to help agencies prepare andhelp people prepare for that
emerging reality. You and yourcolleagues have been pretty
busy with your research. Pleasetell us about the work that
you're doing.
David Bierling (03:41):
Sure, yeah. A , a lot of the work we've been
doing is focusing on updatingthe plans for hurricane
evacuation zones. Of course,TTI does a lot of research on
different aspects of climateand resiliency. And those tie
in with the tropical cyclonesas well. Though we've got folks
that are studyinginfrastructure vulnerability.
(04:03):
When a roadway is damagedbecause of a storm event, how
can we diagnose what that is?
How can we rehabilitate itbetter? How can we use
intelligent transportationsystems to understand where
roadways are gonna flood? Sowe've got a lot of things going
on here at the agency. What wedo is we take the latest
information from NOAA and theNational Hurricane Center
about, for example, stormsurge, how high might the water
(04:26):
get? And we overlay that withother information to help
communities better understandwhere the hazards are. And then
we work with them to update theevacuation zones that they can
use to plan and implement aresponse for a storm that comes
(04:47):
in. And then we look at moreintense storms that might come
in and look at the storm surge,where it's going to impact
who's there, what is theinfrastructure. And we , when
we're working with communitiesto help update these evacuation
zones, we're going to now isidentifying recognizable
geographic boundaries. Andoften those are roads, right?
Major roads in an area 'causepeople are gonna know those,
(05:09):
they travel those every day sothey can recognize that. And
that's kind of a directionwe've moved towards rather than
if you've seen maybe some ofthe old evacuation zones where
it's kind of got like thiscurvy area, you know, it's nice
and smoothed out and it mightfollow exactly the topography
of the forecasted surge impact,but that's not as useful for
(05:30):
decision making . We need togive folks a recognizable
geographic landmark that theycan understand. Our work has
been in partnership between TTIand Texas A&M University's ,
uh, hazard Reduction andRecovery Center. And we've been
working on projects fundedthrough Army Corps of Engineers
(05:52):
and FEMA in partnership withthe state division of emergency
management, other stateagencies, and most importantly
with local communities andjurisdictions. And that's been
to understand what are theimpacts due to hurricanes,
particularly storm surge. Ifyou look in terms of life risk
(06:14):
and life safety is always apriority in terms of life risk.
About half of the fatalitiesfrom tropical cyclones tends to
come from storm surge with theothers, from other related
impacts, drowning and thosesorts of things.
Bernie Fette (06:27):
And , and whenever you mention storm
surge, just so we can be sureeveryone understands the storm
surge, is the water as opposedto the impact that comes from
the wind, is thatoversimplifying?
David Bierling (06:40):
That's it's close. Okay . So storm surge,
if I think about that, I have astorm, a cyclone, and it's
rotating over water. And as aresult of the winds and the
rotation, it builds up a wallof water. And typically that
wall of water is greatest onthe northeast quadrant because
of the way the rotation is ofthe storm. Right. Okay . Right.
(07:03):
And it's not the , the , thelevel of water. So the storm is
building up this water and itcomes in and it hits land, and
as it hits land, that wall ofwater comes up and it envelops
the coastal areas, the lowercoastal areas that are adjacent
to the coast. Of course thenthe storm might also drop
precipitation. Right. And so wehad this, for example, it
(07:26):
Harvey's a recent example thatcomes to mind. So it hit the
first landfall in Texas, hit asa hurricane, a category four
hurricane, went back over thewater, moved up the coast a
little bit, came in as atropical storm and dropped lots
and lots and lots of rain. Sothat was a precipitation event.
Both of them are water. One iswhere I'm driving this wall of
(07:48):
water from the sea surface orthe gulf surface here in Texas.
Another one is I'm dropping alot of precipitation. It
collects and has to gosomewhere. And if there's too
much precipitation or if I'mgetting precipitation, that
comes from a place that'supstream and flows downstream,
and then the river comes out ofits banks . Those are two types
of water-driven events that canalso affect, but there's
(08:09):
certainly other impacts. Wind,hurricanes can also spawn
tornadoes. We have impactscalled na-tec disasters where I
have a natural disaster, like ahurricane that comes in. And
here in Texas we've got lots ofenergy and petrochemical
infrastructure. So it comes inand then it impacts a facility
(08:30):
of some sort. And now we've gota technological disaster. So
those are called na- tecevents. So it's not necessarily
that a tropical cyclone onlycauses storm surge events, even
though that's where a lot ofour work has been on these
projects, there's a greatvariety of hazards that can
happen from them.
Bernie Fette (08:47):
So tell us a little bit more about the focus
areas that you're working on interms of , again , this all
kind of revolves around thenotion of evacuation, correct?
Mm-Hmm. .
David Bierling (08:59):
Yeah. Well, as storms and storm forecasting
has changed over time, NOAA andits other partners have been
able to update their stormsurge forecasts. So they do
modeling where they look atwhat is the maximum level that
they expect for water to getbased on a storm. And it's
(09:21):
important to recognize herethat just because a storm has a
higher category of wind speeddoesn't mean necessarily that's
gonna have a greater level ofsurge than a lower category
storm. Ike is a good example.
Katrina's another good examplewhere you've got a storm out
there in the Gulf and it's abig, big storm, builds up a big
(09:45):
amount of surge. You know,you've got this big wall of
water that's sloshing out therein the Gulf, and it comes in
and it drops down in intensity,the wind speed drops, but it's
still got this big wall ofwater. There's a lot of
momentum in there. And so justbecause a storm's a lower
category in terms of wind speeddoesn't necessarily mean that
the storm surge effect isreduced as well.
Bernie Fette (10:08):
So does that then mean that a lower category
number storm could produce moredamage, more mayhem than a
higher numbered category storm?
Let's say, just forconversation, it's possible
that a category three hurricanecould be more destructive than
(10:30):
a category five, depending onother circumstances like the
degree of storm surge, etcetera.
David Bierling (10:36):
Yeah there's not a direct relationship. A
lot of that depends on thehistory of the storm. What did
it do before it got here? Howlong did it have to build up?
What does that history of thestorm that affects it? So just
because it makes landfall at alower category doesn't mean
right that it's lost thatintensity that it might have
had before. Then I might alsohave a very small storm that
(10:58):
has a very high intensityaround the , uh, eye of the
hurricane, for example, but itmight not be very large
geographically. Okay . It mightbe relatively compact. And then
if I compare that to, forexample, a category of wind
speed lower, but it's muchbigger now, I'm moving a lot
more water, I've got a lot moreenergy in there, even though
(11:19):
it's wind speed.
Bernie Fette (11:20):
Right. And location you mentioned could
be, again, a lower categorystorm striking one area of the
coast producing more damagethan a higher category storm
that perhaps made landfall inan area without as much
petrochemical activity,refineries and population,
right?
David Bierling (11:41):
Yeah, sure. And you know, talking about
category, that that's actuallyan area that forecaster storm
surge modelers, emergencymanagers are trying to get a
little bit away of thinkingabout these storms only in
terms of categories, right? Andso that's why when we've used
the most updated informationavailable through NOAA and
National Hurricane Center,they're looking at all sorts of
(12:03):
different scenarios about if Ihave a storm that comes in from
the south or from thesoutheast, you know, all that
direction of how it impacts thecoast, the topography of the
coast is a big factor. Youknow, a place that's flat for a
long, long, long way, water cango a lot more distance over
there. If I've got this stormsurge that's coming in, yeah.
(12:24):
Then if I have somethingthat's, for example, a big
change in the topography rightnear the coast so that we've
got a big change in elevation,I've got some sort of
protection there. Think aboutmanmade protection on the
Galveston sea wall is a goodexample. So the water just, it
can't go inland as far. And sotopography plays a factor
there, too.
Bernie Fette (12:42):
One of the things that I noticed in your research
and that I wonder about is howdemographics figures into the
work that you've been doing andinto the considerations that
local communities and agencieshave to take into account.
David Bierling (13:01):
Yeah. So we're pulling together a lot of
information from a lot ofdifferent places, and we're
consolidating that into aresource that we put together
under our projects that we'recalling the hurricane
evacuation study atlas. Andthese atlases, they're
available to the public,they're available to local
agencies. They are a data andinformation resource that local
(13:27):
agencies can use to understandwhere are their risks, who's in
those locations, and what aretheir vulnerabilities. So for
example, I might have aneighborhood or an area of my
community that has a greaternumber of folks that have
vehicle limitations, they don'thave a car, or I might have
folks there that are elderly,they might have medical
concerns, I might have folksthere that have language
(13:50):
barrier issues. How do we getcommunications out to them? How
do we get notifications out tothem? And so when we take that
information about where ourimpacts, who is there, we can
start to look at what might mydemands be for an evacuation or
if not an evacuation, what aremy community needs going to be
(14:11):
when we're trying to get thingsback up and running? We've also
included the information therefrom workforce. Where are
people working at? Where arethe workers living? One of the
main drivers of a community'srecovery after a major storm or
a major disaster is gettingthat local economy back
running. People need resources,folks need food, they also need
(14:32):
jobs, they need income. They'rereally important. So we need to
be thinking about in additionto just how do I implement the
evacuation? How do I get thingsrunning again, once we're
starting to recover. So we'veput this information tool
together, and by the way, we'veput an address search tool in
there that the public can use.
And if they have a questionabout, okay, well I live in
(14:53):
this location, in this address,they can look that up, what's
my risk zone? Might my locationbe affected by storm surge?
They can type in that address,turn on that storm surge layer,
and find out what the stormsurge impact for their
community might be . Right nowwe've got the storm surge
projections for the full Texascoast. So if someone is
concerned about storm surge intheir location farther up the
(15:16):
coast, they can type in theiraddress and see what the surge
impacts are. We'd like to beable to update that information
to include flood zones as wellas wind for higher up the coast
as well.
Bernie Fette (15:26):
You've covered a lot of territory here, David.
What are the main two or threepoints that you hope that
people would take away from ourconversation today?
David Bierling (15:34):
Well, I think number one is there's lots of
great resources out there thatpeople can look at to take
initial steps for theirevacuation plans, follow the
guidance given on Texasready.gov , FEMA's preparedness
website, National HurricaneCenter, National Weather
Service. There's very goodguidance out there on how to be
prepared. In addition, theyneed to think about their own
(15:58):
situation, their own family,their own friends, their own
community. So if I have toevacuate, where am I gonna
stay? This is a big one. Whatam I gonna take with me? What
do I need to do to get my homeready? What kind of resources
do I have to get for that?
Where am I gonna get thoseresources from? How many trips
am I gonna be taking? Am Igoing to send a group ahead?
And we have , uh, one or twopeople that stay behind to get
(16:20):
ready and leave separately? Andthis is all part of
preparedness. It's veryimportant. Three, I need to
understand that I might not beable to come back just because
the storm's come and gone intwo or three days, and if I've
been able to get out andevacuate, I might not be able
to get back right away. So Ineed to be prepared a little
bit for the long haul.
Recognize that local and stateofficials and federal officials
(16:42):
are doing their best to getcommunities back online, but
that doesn't necessarily meanthat everybody's going to be
able to just come back to theirresidence just because the
storm's gone. These are thingsthat we've looked at in some of
our research and understandingthese things helps us develop
the models for assessing whatare the evacuation times. That,
in turn, helps provide localofficials and state officials
(17:05):
with information that they canhopefully use to make better
evacuation decisions. If I havean area, let's say it's a major
urbanized area and it's gonnatake 72 hours, 96 hours to
evacuate folks, and I get arapid storm. Harvey spun up
very fast, right? We remember2017, Harvey wasn't expected to
(17:26):
reach near the intensity thatit did, but it spun up really
fast. And when that happens,because of the time needed to
implement things likecontraflow, it's not like
somebody just flips a switchand okay, well three hours
we're doing contraflow, takes alot longer to coordinate that.
It's a major, major change inhow transportation systems
operate. And so I think that'sa major consideration that
(17:49):
people should have is that ourlocal officials, elected
officials, state officials,federal officials, they can't
just make a decision on a dimeand two hours later, okay,
everything's all hunky dory .
So people need to think aboutin advance, what am I going to
need to do to help protectmyself, help protect my family,
my community, my friends, andhow can we work together?
Bernie Fette (18:13):
Okay, last question. In 50 words or less,
if you can, what motivates youto get up and come to work
every day ?
David Bierling (18:22):
One, helping communities, working with great
partners, working with greatpeople, working on interesting
puzzles.
Bernie Fette (18:29):
David Bierling, research scientist at TTI. This
has been very enlightening,David, and very timely. Thanks
for sharing your time andhelping us understand this.
David Bierling (18:39):
Thank you, Bernie. It's been great to be
here.
Bernie Fette (18:42):
Predictions for the 2024 tropical storm season
call for hyperactiveconditions. With the number of
named storms and hurricaneswell above the average over the
past 30 years, we can expecttropical cyclones to be more
numerous and more intense thanever before. Thanks to
increasingly sophisticatedmodeling, hurricane forecasting
(19:05):
has improved over time andalong with it, so have the
steps for evacuation andrecovery -- altogether aimed at
helping states and communitiesget back to the routines of
life as quickly as possibleafter a tropical weather
disaster. Thanks for listening.
Please take just a minute togive us a review, subscribe and
(19:28):
share this episode, and pleasejoin us next time for another
conversation about gettingourselves and the stuff we need
from point A to point B.
Thinking Transportation is aproduction of the Texas A&M
Transportation Institute, amember of the Texas A&M
University system. The show isedited and produced by Chris
(19:49):
Pourteau. I'm your writer andhost , Bernie Fette. Thanks
again for joining us. We'll seeyou next time .
Hey everyone.
Welcome to ThinkingTransportation -- conversations
about how we get ourselves andthe stuff we need from one
place to another. I'm BernieFette with the Texas A&M
Transportation Institute.
Hurricane season is upon usonce again, and climate experts
across the U.S. are predictingan especially active period
(00:37):
from June through November,driven largely by
higher-than-average sea surfacetemperatures. With more storms
than ever expected to reachhurricane intensity, the need
for careful and effectiveplanning for storm response has
never been more urgent. Withthat in mind, we are
rebroadcasting a previousepisode on this topic,
(00:59):
featuring David Bierling, aresearch scientist at TTI and
an expert in the field of massevacuations of areas affected
by weather disasters. Thank youfor joining us, David.
David Bierling (01:12):
Thank you for having me, Bernie.
Bernie Fette (01:14):
Before we consider the hurricane season
that just started and the workthat you're doing, let's talk a
little bit about hurricanehistory, if we could,
particularly in Texas. Can yougive us a quick review?
David Bierling (01:28):
You know, hurricane season just started
here on June 1, and it runs upinto November. But that being
said, there's definitely peaksin the season about a quarter
of the tropical cyclones thataffect Texas in some way or
another. And this is notnecessarily even getting to a
hurricane level storm. We canhave a tropical storm like
(01:48):
Allison that has a majorimpact. Of course, a tropical
storm Allison came in earlyJune, 2001, dropped a lot of
rain in southeast Texas andreally screwed things up. So
we've got about a quarter ofthe storms that impact Texas in
July and June, and aboutanother 60 percent impact Texas
in August and September withmost of that impact coming in
(02:10):
September.
Bernie Fette (02:11):
And that's a pattern that typically follows
from year to year or season toseason.
David Bierling (02:15):
The short answer, Bernie, is yes, that's
a typical pattern that tends tohold out. Hurricane season runs
from June through November.
Bernie Fette (02:22):
It's helpful for us to understand that pattern.
And it sounds like that thatpattern typically, or generally
speaking, follows from year toyear , from season to season .
Considering that history again,are there any ways that
tropical storms, hurricanes,and other storms have changed
over that time?
David Bierling (02:43):
Well, climate researchers are seeing evidence
that storms seem to beintensifying over time. So if
you look at some of theresearch that the folks at NOAA
put out and other researchers,they're saying that given
changes in climate, we canexpect to see more intense
tropical cyclones.
Bernie Fette (03:04):
Okay. And that quick review brings us up to
now, and most of thepredictions that people can
find online about the 2022tropical storm season say that
it's going to be a more activethan usual few months, more
storms that will be intenseenough to earn a name and of
those more that will reachhurricane intensity. Right? So
(03:29):
to help agencies prepare andhelp people prepare for that
emerging reality. You and yourcolleagues have been pretty
busy with your research. Pleasetell us about the work that
you're doing.
David Bierling (03:41):
Sure, yeah. A , a lot of the work we've been
doing is focusing on updatingthe plans for hurricane
evacuation zones. Of course,TTI does a lot of research on
different aspects of climateand resiliency. And those tie
in with the tropical cyclonesas well. Though we've got folks
that are studyinginfrastructure vulnerability.
(04:03):
When a roadway is damagedbecause of a storm event, how
can we diagnose what that is?
How can we rehabilitate itbetter? How can we use
intelligent transportationsystems to understand where
roadways are gonna flood? Sowe've got a lot of things going
on here at the agency. What wedo is we take the latest
information from NOAA and theNational Hurricane Center
about, for example, stormsurge, how high might the water
(04:26):
get? And we overlay that withother information to help
communities better understandwhere the hazards are. And then
we work with them to update theevacuation zones that they can
use to plan and implement aresponse for a storm that comes
(04:47):
in. And then we look at moreintense storms that might come
in and look at the storm surge,where it's going to impact
who's there, what is theinfrastructure. And we , when
we're working with communitiesto help update these evacuation
zones, we're going to now isidentifying recognizable
geographic boundaries. Andoften those are roads, right?
Major roads in an area 'causepeople are gonna know those,
(05:09):
they travel those every day sothey can recognize that. And
that's kind of a directionwe've moved towards rather than
if you've seen maybe some ofthe old evacuation zones where
it's kind of got like thiscurvy area, you know, it's nice
and smoothed out and it mightfollow exactly the topography
of the forecasted surge impact,but that's not as useful for
(05:30):
decision making . We need togive folks a recognizable
geographic landmark that theycan understand. Our work has
been in partnership between TTIand Texas A&M University's ,
uh, hazard Reduction andRecovery Center. And we've been
working on projects fundedthrough Army Corps of Engineers
(05:52):
and FEMA in partnership withthe state division of emergency
management, other stateagencies, and most importantly
with local communities andjurisdictions. And that's been
to understand what are theimpacts due to hurricanes,
particularly storm surge. Ifyou look in terms of life risk
(06:14):
and life safety is always apriority in terms of life risk.
About half of the fatalitiesfrom tropical cyclones tends to
come from storm surge with theothers, from other related
impacts, drowning and thosesorts of things.
Bernie Fette (06:27):
And , and whenever you mention storm
surge, just so we can be sureeveryone understands the storm
surge, is the water as opposedto the impact that comes from
the wind, is thatoversimplifying?
David Bierling (06:40):
That's it's close. Okay . So storm surge,
if I think about that, I have astorm, a cyclone, and it's
rotating over water. And as aresult of the winds and the
rotation, it builds up a wallof water. And typically that
wall of water is greatest onthe northeast quadrant because
of the way the rotation is ofthe storm. Right. Okay . Right.
(07:03):
And it's not the , the , thelevel of water. So the storm is
building up this water and itcomes in and it hits land, and
as it hits land, that wall ofwater comes up and it envelops
the coastal areas, the lowercoastal areas that are adjacent
to the coast. Of course thenthe storm might also drop
precipitation. Right. And so wehad this, for example, it
(07:26):
Harvey's a recent example thatcomes to mind. So it hit the
first landfall in Texas, hit asa hurricane, a category four
hurricane, went back over thewater, moved up the coast a
little bit, came in as atropical storm and dropped lots
and lots and lots of rain. Sothat was a precipitation event.
Both of them are water. One iswhere I'm driving this wall of
(07:48):
water from the sea surface orthe gulf surface here in Texas.
Another one is I'm dropping alot of precipitation. It
collects and has to gosomewhere. And if there's too
much precipitation or if I'mgetting precipitation, that
comes from a place that'supstream and flows downstream,
and then the river comes out ofits banks . Those are two types
of water-driven events that canalso affect, but there's
(08:09):
certainly other impacts. Wind,hurricanes can also spawn
tornadoes. We have impactscalled na-tec disasters where I
have a natural disaster, like ahurricane that comes in. And
here in Texas we've got lots ofenergy and petrochemical
infrastructure. So it comes inand then it impacts a facility
(08:30):
of some sort. And now we've gota technological disaster. So
those are called na- tecevents. So it's not necessarily
that a tropical cyclone onlycauses storm surge events, even
though that's where a lot ofour work has been on these
projects, there's a greatvariety of hazards that can
happen from them.
Bernie Fette (08:47):
So tell us a little bit more about the focus
areas that you're working on interms of , again , this all
kind of revolves around thenotion of evacuation, correct?
Mm-Hmm.
David Bierling (08:59):
Yeah. Well, as storms and storm forecasting
has changed over time, NOAA andits other partners have been
able to update their stormsurge forecasts. So they do
modeling where they look atwhat is the maximum level that
they expect for water to getbased on a storm. And it's
(09:21):
important to recognize herethat just because a storm has a
higher category of wind speeddoesn't mean necessarily that's
gonna have a greater level ofsurge than a lower category
storm. Ike is a good example.
Katrina's another good examplewhere you've got a storm out
there in the Gulf and it's abig, big storm, builds up a big
(09:45):
amount of surge. You know,you've got this big wall of
water that's sloshing out therein the Gulf, and it comes in
and it drops down in intensity,the wind speed drops, but it's
still got this big wall ofwater. There's a lot of
momentum in there. And so justbecause a storm's a lower
category in terms of wind speeddoesn't necessarily mean that
the storm surge effect isreduced as well.
Bernie Fette (10:08):
So does that then mean that a lower category
number storm could produce moredamage, more mayhem than a
higher numbered category storm?
Let's say, just forconversation, it's possible
that a category three hurricanecould be more destructive than
(10:30):
a category five, depending onother circumstances like the
degree of storm surge, etcetera.
David Bierling (10:36):
Yeah there's not a direct relationship. A
lot of that depends on thehistory of the storm. What did
it do before it got here? Howlong did it have to build up?
What does that history of thestorm that affects it? So just
because it makes landfall at alower category doesn't mean
right that it's lost thatintensity that it might have
had before. Then I might alsohave a very small storm that
(10:58):
has a very high intensityaround the , uh, eye of the
hurricane, for example, but itmight not be very large
geographically. Okay . It mightbe relatively compact. And then
if I compare that to, forexample, a category of wind
speed lower, but it's muchbigger now, I'm moving a lot
more water, I've got a lot moreenergy in there, even though
(11:19):
it's wind speed.
Bernie Fette (11:20):
Right. And location you mentioned could
be, again, a lower categorystorm striking one area of the
coast producing more damagethan a higher category storm
that perhaps made landfall inan area without as much
petrochemical activity,refineries and population,
right?
David Bierling (11:41):
Yeah, sure. And you know, talking about
category, that that's actuallyan area that forecaster storm
surge modelers, emergencymanagers are trying to get a
little bit away of thinkingabout these storms only in
terms of categories, right? Andso that's why when we've used
the most updated informationavailable through NOAA and
National Hurricane Center,they're looking at all sorts of
(12:03):
different scenarios about if Ihave a storm that comes in from
the south or from thesoutheast, you know, all that
direction of how it impacts thecoast, the topography of the
coast is a big factor. Youknow, a place that's flat for a
long, long, long way, water cango a lot more distance over
there. If I've got this stormsurge that's coming in, yeah.
(12:24):
Then if I have somethingthat's, for example, a big
change in the topography rightnear the coast so that we've
got a big change in elevation,I've got some sort of
protection there. Think aboutmanmade protection on the
Galveston sea wall is a goodexample. So the water just, it
can't go inland as far. And sotopography plays a factor
there, too.
Bernie Fette (12:42):
One of the things that I noticed in your research
and that I wonder about is howdemographics figures into the
work that you've been doing andinto the considerations that
local communities and agencieshave to take into account.
David Bierling (13:01):
Yeah. So we're pulling together a lot of
information from a lot ofdifferent places, and we're
consolidating that into aresource that we put together
under our projects that we'recalling the hurricane
evacuation study atlas. Andthese atlases, they're
available to the public,they're available to local
agencies. They are a data andinformation resource that local
(13:27):
agencies can use to understandwhere are their risks, who's in
those locations, and what aretheir vulnerabilities. So for
example, I might have aneighborhood or an area of my
community that has a greaternumber of folks that have
vehicle limitations, they don'thave a car, or I might have
folks there that are elderly,they might have medical
concerns, I might have folksthere that have language
(13:50):
barrier issues. How do we getcommunications out to them? How
do we get notifications out tothem? And so when we take that
information about where ourimpacts, who is there, we can
start to look at what might mydemands be for an evacuation or
if not an evacuation, what aremy community needs going to be
(14:11):
when we're trying to get thingsback up and running? We've also
included the information therefrom workforce. Where are
people working at? Where arethe workers living? One of the
main drivers of a community'srecovery after a major storm or
a major disaster is gettingthat local economy back
running. People need resources,folks need food, they also need
(14:32):
jobs, they need income. They'rereally important. So we need to
be thinking about in additionto just how do I implement the
evacuation? How do I get thingsrunning again, once we're
starting to recover. So we'veput this information tool
together, and by the way, we'veput an address search tool in
there that the public can use.
And if they have a questionabout, okay, well I live in
(14:53):
this location, in this address,they can look that up, what's
my risk zone? Might my locationbe affected by storm surge?
They can type in that address,turn on that storm surge layer,
and find out what the stormsurge impact for their
community might be . Right nowwe've got the storm surge
projections for the full Texascoast. So if someone is
concerned about storm surge intheir location farther up the
(15:16):
coast, they can type in theiraddress and see what the surge
impacts are. We'd like to beable to update that information
to include flood zones as wellas wind for higher up the coast
as well.
Bernie Fette (15:26):
You've covered a lot of territory here, David.
What are the main two or threepoints that you hope that
people would take away from ourconversation today?
David Bierling (15:34):
Well, I think number one is there's lots of
great resources out there thatpeople can look at to take
initial steps for theirevacuation plans, follow the
guidance given on Texasready.gov , FEMA's preparedness
website, National HurricaneCenter, National Weather
Service. There's very goodguidance out there on how to be
prepared. In addition, theyneed to think about their own
(15:58):
situation, their own family,their own friends, their own
community. So if I have toevacuate, where am I gonna
stay? This is a big one. Whatam I gonna take with me? What
do I need to do to get my homeready? What kind of resources
do I have to get for that?
Where am I gonna get thoseresources from? How many trips
am I gonna be taking? Am Igoing to send a group ahead?
And we have , uh, one or twopeople that stay behind to get
(16:20):
ready and leave separately? Andthis is all part of
preparedness. It's veryimportant. Three, I need to
understand that I might not beable to come back just because
the storm's come and gone intwo or three days, and if I've
been able to get out andevacuate, I might not be able
to get back right away. So Ineed to be prepared a little
bit for the long haul.
Recognize that local and stateofficials and federal officials
(16:42):
are doing their best to getcommunities back online, but
that doesn't necessarily meanthat everybody's going to be
able to just come back to theirresidence just because the
storm's gone. These are thingsthat we've looked at in some of
our research and understandingthese things helps us develop
the models for assessing whatare the evacuation times. That,
in turn, helps provide localofficials and state officials
(17:05):
with information that they canhopefully use to make better
evacuation decisions. If I havean area, let's say it's a major
urbanized area and it's gonnatake 72 hours, 96 hours to
evacuate folks, and I get arapid storm. Harvey spun up
very fast, right? We remember2017, Harvey wasn't expected to
(17:26):
reach near the intensity thatit did, but it spun up really
fast. And when that happens,because of the time needed to
implement things likecontraflow, it's not like
somebody just flips a switchand okay, well three hours
we're doing contraflow, takes alot longer to coordinate that.
It's a major, major change inhow transportation systems
operate. And so I think that'sa major consideration that
(17:49):
people should have is that ourlocal officials, elected
officials, state officials,federal officials, they can't
just make a decision on a dimeand two hours later, okay,
everything's all hunky dory .
So people need to think aboutin advance, what am I going to
need to do to help protectmyself, help protect my family,
my community, my friends, andhow can we work together?
Bernie Fette (18:13):
Okay, last question. In 50 words or less,
if you can, what motivates youto get up and come to work
every day ?
David Bierling (18:22):
One, helping communities, working with great
partners, working with greatpeople, working on interesting
puzzles.
Bernie Fette (18:29):
David Bierling, research scientist at TTI. This
has been very enlightening,David, and very timely. Thanks
for sharing your time andhelping us understand this.
David Bierling (18:39):
Thank you, Bernie. It's been great to be
here.
Bernie Fette (18:42):
Predictions for the 2024 tropical storm season
call for hyperactiveconditions. With the number of
named storms and hurricaneswell above the average over the
past 30 years, we can expecttropical cyclones to be more
numerous and more intense thanever before. Thanks to
increasingly sophisticatedmodeling, hurricane forecasting
(19:05):
has improved over time andalong with it, so have the
steps for evacuation andrecovery -- altogether aimed at
helping states and communitiesget back to the routines of
life as quickly as possibleafter a tropical weather
disaster. Thanks for listening.
Please take just a minute togive us a review, subscribe and
(19:28):
share this episode, and pleasejoin us next time for another
conversation about gettingourselves and the stuff we need
from point A to point B.
Thinking Transportation is aproduction of the Texas A&M
Transportation Institute, amember of the Texas A&M
University system. The show isedited and produced by Chris
(19:49):
Pourteau. I'm your writer andhost , Bernie Fette. Thanks
again for joining us. We'll seeyou next time .
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