Caro-COOPS.org Discussion Board

lianxie · Joined: 25 Feb 2025 Posts: 17

Hi all,

Earle asked us to prepare a list of storm surge model data and send it to South Carolina (SC)(please see the attached file for detail). We need to complete the work before September 16. Below is my assignment of tasks to each of you.

1. Wind forcing: Dr. Bao will be in charge of this task.

What to do: we need to prepare two sets of wind forcing. Set 1: idealized wind forcing from Holland's hurricane wind model. In this option, the input data will be: storm track, minimum pressure, maximum wind radius, and maximum wind speed. We need to create a data file which contains above information for a list of historical hurricanes that affected South Carolina. The format of the data should be readable by our storm surge model (CEMEPS). Once we created the file, we will send it to SC. We will try to access the file from our model later.

Set 2: HRD hurricane wind data. We need to get the data from AOML/HRD and reformat the data to meet our requirement. We have used this data set for hurricane Emily and Fran. Again, we just need to prepare the data file for a few historical SC hurricanes.

2. Streamflow data: Mr. Jim Epps will work with Dr. Peng on this task. What to do: We need to identify all major SC rivers and collect all the available streamflow data and water level data for the Caro-Coops region. Jim will create the data file according to data formats specified by Dr. Peng. The streamflow data will be used to describe the river forcing.

3. Precipitation: Mr. Jim Epps will be in charge of this task. What to do: collect rain gauge data for SC river basins. We may not need this for the test run, but will eventually include it in the forcing field in the future.

4. Topography and baathymetry: Dr. Peng will be in charge of this task. What to do: create a topographic data base for the three proposed Caro-Coops high resolution domains. Data source: NOAA coastal bathymetry and USGS elevation data. For offshore region, we need to merge the coastal data with the ETOPO5 data.

If you have any question or need more directions, please let me know.

--- Lian

jcothran · Joined: 24 Feb 2025 Posts: 143 Location: Columbia, SC

Yes, this gives me more insight.

Let me explain some of what I'm trying to understand from this exercise. The end system as I currently imagine it is that ASG collects the dynamic input variables(wind, river runoff, lateral fluxes, waves) and while we may collect/store the more static or predictable elements(topography, bathymetry, tides), we may leave a copy of these datasets with the model to speed things up.

When a request is made by an agency(say Emergency Preparedness for example) for a 48 hour prediction, this would start an export process whereby the elements(files) the model needs for input are provided from the ASG database. At this point I'm unsure of the details of what conversions may be needed going from say the wind variables as they exist on the ASG database to the file format as needed by the model. I'm unsure of the complexity/completeness of your conversion tools or what this process is. Our goal(my understanding anyway) is that this should be an automatic process where the ASG database provides the model with the input needed and the model produces output.

The format of the model output is also an unknown to me currently. For a user like Emergency Preparedness I would imagine that they might want an ArcView layer which might indicate the footage flooding by area. We're still in the process of familiarizing ourselves with the ESRI products, but the user would be notified when this or some data product like this was available and ready for viewing.

So while we will be changing the point of origin for these input files from something local to something remote, the creation of the input files will also be of interest to me as it relates to their synthesis from the ASG database. And the format and meaning of the output will also be of interest as well as we'll be delivering this or conversions from it to the users.

Thanks and please call or email if you have questions/concerns, Jeremy