The Science of Hurricane Sandy Liveblog

Welcome to the Science of Hurricane Sandy liveblog? we?re the Scientific American representatives at ScienceWriters2012 and now we?re trapped in Raleigh, North Carolina thanks to Sandy.?We have founded?Scientific American?s first-ever ?Raleigh bureau? and will be live-blogging on the storm and answering your storm science questions.

If you have pictures, video, audio or questions about Sandy?share them with us at sciamsandy@gmail.com, our facebook page, or tweet @sciam with #sciamsandy. You can also follow us on Twitter: Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato @mbloudoff, Marissa Fessenden @marisfessenden, and Daisy Yuhas @daisyyuhas.

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News Update?Coastal Transformation
6:56pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Credit: Gerard Marrone

How will the storm re-shape the shore? The USGS released a statement this morning that as much as 93 percent of the coastline in Long Island and 98 percent in New Jersey could experience dune erosion. As the waves erode dunes they leave the beach vulnerable to further erosion. The beaches stretching south from Rehoboth Beach, Delaware along Maryland and Virginia may face the most significant changes.

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Scenes from Sandy?Marblehead, Massachussetts 1:30pm EDT
6:02pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Credit: Brian Birke

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News Update?Preparing for the storm
5:49pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Tonight, probably after 8pm EDT, Sandy?s center will reach land. As the storm approaches, it?s critical for people in affected areas to follow local instructions regarding evacuations and preparedness. Scientific American?s David Biello describes the situation in New York City.

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Anatomy of a Hurricane
5:33 pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Credit: The COMET Program Steven Deyo / USGS Betsy Boynton Researchers

Not all hurricanes are the same ?Sandy, for example, is more than a thousand miles in diameter? but they share a common structure. Surrounding the calm eye of the storm, a hurricane?s eyewall harbors the most violent winds and intense precipitation. Eyewalls of long-lived storms can contract and a new eyewall may form. Hurricane Andrew ratcheted up to Category 5 as it hit land in 1992 and built a new eyewall.

Researchers based at the University of Rhode Island developed an online resource covering hurricane science, which includes this explanation of hurricane structure and contributions from middle and high school teachers.
?Marissa Fessenden

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Weird Weather??Hurricane Sandy is weird.
5:17pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Hurricane Sandy has an asymmetrical wind field, which means its most powerful winds are located in the left-rear quadrant. Most storms of Sandy?s caliber are strongest in the front, right quadrant.

?What?s interesting about the storm is it?s undergoing an extra-tropical transition,? said Forrest Masters, a wind engineer at the University of Florida. ?Sandy?s a slightly different animal than we?ve been looking at in the past.?

The switch makes it difficult for Masters? team to track the storm as it heads toward their southern New Jersey base. It also means that when Sandy first hits land, East Coast residents are only experiencing partial wind load?and might misjudge the severity of the storm.*

?Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato

*Correction 5:30 EDT pm, October 29, 2012: Duplicate sentence deleted.

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News Update?Which reactors will shut down?
5:11pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

This evening, Hurricane Sandy is expected to make landfall in southeast New Jersey. Reuters reports that at least two New Jersey nuclear power plants in the storm?s path will likely be shut down. Monitoring of the situation is ongoing?but the shut down would knock out about 19 percent of the state?s electricity.

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Hurricane Fact or Fiction? Do hurricanes induce labor?
4:39 pm EDT?Monday, October 29, 2012

Hurricane Sandy?s potency comes in part from the storm?s unusually low barometric pressure. As noted in The Christian Science Monitor, there?s a theory that suggests low pressure might cause the amniotic sac to break?inducing labor.

A quick search through the scientific literature suggests the claim isn?t new (see this 1985 study in The Journal of Reproductive Medicine) but it is contentious. In 2007, a study in the Archives of Gynecology and Obstetrics suggested that deliveries might increase on days with a marked change in barometric pressure. But exactly how that relationship worked was unclear. A 2005 study in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology, however, found no relationship between atmospheric conditions and birth rate.

While the jury may be out on this?there?s more obvious (and scientifically defensible) worries about hurricanes and pregnant women. Stress is a big one, as is dehydration. The CDC offers a fact sheet on disaster preparedness for expecting mothers that touches on a few of these points.

?Daisy Yuhas

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Q&A? a wind engineer, ?Storms don?t have to cause damage?
4:15 pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Credit: Christine Gorman, Scientific American

University of Florida wind engineer Forrest Masters has been in 25 major storms since 1999. He?s built a career on?measuring the metrics of hurricanes, planting his equipment in the path of oncoming super storms to learn more about how they function. Masters has a team of researchers stationed in southern New Jersey, waiting for Hurricane Sandy.?Scientific American interviewed Masters about his contributions to the field.

[An edited transcript follows]

Q: You go into the path of oncoming storms to take measurements. How does that work?
We deploy rugged weather stations to measure surface level turbulence in suburban communities with the objective of basically measuring important properties that affect building performance.

We?re trying to quantify how the wind varies with time. That?s important because damage to residential buildings is an issue. The U.S. has experienced more than $110 billion in insured loss because of inadequate building performance, and we need to get a handle on how we characterize pressure loads on structures.

Q: How do you use the data you collect?
Ultimately these data give us a better baseline on the environmental conditions during hurricanes.

We use this information to make better decisions about building communities. We?re trying to make communities more resilient and in order to do that we have to have more accurate information.

Q: What?s the biggest misconception about hurricanes?
The biggest myth is that damage caused in hurricanes is unavoidable. We have the means and the technologies to prevent significant losses in hurricanes. We haven?t realized that yet. A lot of people assume that hurricanes are acts of god.

Q: What is it like being outside in a hurricane?
I?ve done it enough times that it?s not a rush. It?s work. It?s overwhelming.

Being in the storm is one thing but actually seeing the effects of the storm, being there in the aftermath, how people?s lives are affected ? that affects me far more than the storm itself.
?Mollie Bloudoff-Indelicato

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News Update? Sandy v. Irene Visual
3:40 pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Credit: NASA

How does Sandy stack up to previous hurricanes? Scientific American?s Mark Fischetti has the numbers for Hurricane Irene and Hurricane Sandy. Over at The Wall Street Journal, they?ve set up a visual comparison of Sandy and 2011?s Hurricane Irene?which they report cost more than $15 billion in damages.

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My First Storm? Marissa Fessenden
3:24pm EDT Monday, October 29, 2012

Hurricane Sandy is on track to make history, but some weather sticks with you for more personal reasons.

My first storm is also my first memory. It was September and my parents were half an hour away, at their alma mater?s homecoming, leaving my brother and I in the capable hands of our favorite babysitter. I was two years old, so this memory is more constructed than true. A fearsome thunderstorm, not uncommon during summers in Upstate New York took out the power. I remember it was dark and the babysitter held my baby brother and I on the blue couch in our living room. Cracks of thunder shook the house.

That?s all I remember. I must have been terrified for this experience to stamp itself on to my mind. My mom tells me that our babysitter took us into the basement when a branch fell on the power transformer across the road. Arcing and sparks threatened to start a fire. Wind ripped one of the doors off a barn on the family dairy farm. Forage wagons, used to harvest corn or hay, blew across a field and into our back yard.

I also remember a blizzard in 1993 that struck late in the season. My mom reminded me that my dad and uncle worked for 36 hours, caring for and milking about 500 cows every 12 hours by themselves. My uncle drove a tractor through the seven-foot drifts in our driveway to pick up my dad. The milk truck came just in time to empty the bulk tank?they were an hour away from dumping milk down the drain. I remember sledding down the piles of snow. School was closed for a week. I measure all winters against that one and have been disappointed ever since. ?Marissa Fessenden

Source: http://rss.sciam.com/click.phdo?i=d218bffd2187d708faba0846f1abc0d7

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