Interagency Coordination in Hurricane Wind and Storm Surge Hazard Reduction

1. Interagency Coordination in Hurricane Wind and Storm Surge Hazard Reduction John Gaynor NOAA, Office of Weather and Air Quality Interdepartmental Hurricane Conference March 7, 2007

2. Outline(Agency Drivers for Wind and Storm Surge Structural Hazard Research and Application) • Windstorm Impact Reduction Act • US-Japan bilateral Panel on Wind and Seismic Effects • NSB Hurricane Report • NIST-NOAA Disaster Resilient Communities Partnership • Should we coordinate efforts?

3. Available at www.sdr.gov

5. Objective of the Program:

6. Windstorm Impact Reduction Interagency Working Group NIST* NSF* NOAA* (Designated Chair) FEMA* (DHS) FHWA HUD * Specified in legislation Convened: January, 2005 Meets and reports A/L quarterly to SDR Chair of the working group will rotate between NIST, NSF, NOAA and FEMA with each Agency serving a two-year term as chair. Annual progress report

7. INTERAGENCY WORKING GROUP PROCESS: • Inventory and assess existing wind hazard research, mitigation, and preparedness • Define overall needs for wind hazard research, mitigation, and preparedness • Identify gaps in wind hazard research, mitigation, and preparedness • Make recommendations based on prioritized needs • Agencies address priorities in planning and budget processes

8. Areas of Focus of the WindHRP Plan • Understanding, predicting, and forecasting • Enhancing knowledge, information and data on severe winds • Improving prediction of hazardous wind events • Understanding and quantifying wind loading • Understanding the perception of wind hazard risk • Mapping wind hazards • Assessing impacts • Investigating wind resistance of buildings, structures and critical infrastructure • Developing improved tools for component- and structure-level simulation and numerical modeling of wind effects • Developing improved tools for loss assessment of wind hazards • Assessing social costs

9. Areas of Focus of the WindHRP Plan (Continued) • Reducing impacts • Assessing and communicating risk • Developing prototype structural requirements • Demonstration, education, training and outreach on improved codes and building guidelines • Guidance on retrofitting • Innovative technologies • Land use measures and cost effective construction practices • Preparedness and Enhancing Community Resilience • Developing tools for community preparedness to wind hazards • K-12 and college education needs • General public awareness and outreach • Evacuation planning • Enhancing disaster-resistance of building codes and standards • Building public and private partnerships • Conducting emergency response exercises

10. Priority Research Issues • Assessing individual and community capability to respond to wind events, including vulnerability analyses, risk perception, risk communication, risk management, communication of wind warnings and public response, evacuation capability, and public knowledge of appropriate protective actions for wind events, especially among vulnerable populations • Evaluating the response of the built environment and critical infrastructure to wind events by investigating aerodynamic response, load path, ultimate capacity and the performance of the building envelope • Assessing the impact of wind and windborne debris or wind and water/ice/snow • Examining the interaction between wind and storm surge to determine the impact on building foundations and critical infrastructure • Exploring the near-ground and channeling/shielding effects of winds on buildings through testing and instrumentation • Developing new technologies and ground, airborne and satellite based observing systems to improve knowledge and understanding of windstorms and the wind variability within those storms • Measuring the response of bridges and other highway structures to wind events, including stability, serviceability and functionality leading up to and through extreme events • Developing and implementing technologies for rapid repair and restoration of critical infrastructure and critical services

11. Summary of Progress • Despite the lack of appropriations for this program, agencies have been: • Enhancing knowledge, information and data on severe winds • Investigating wind resistance of buildings and structures (in particular, bridge structures) • Developing improved tools for loss assessment of wind hazards • Increasing general public awareness and outreach in very narrow areas • Evacuation planning assistance and guidance • During the past year, there has been little or no progress in: • Understanding the perception of wind hazard risk • Mapping wind hazards • Assessing and communicating risk • Developing prototype structural requirements • Guidance on retrofitting • Innovative technologies • Land use measures and cost effective construction practices • Building public and private partnerships • Conducting emergency response exercises

12. Gaps and Remaining Issues • Of the 8 highest priority research issues in the Implementation Plan, only one is being adequately addressed: • “measuring the response of bridges and other highway structures to wind events, including stability, serviceability and functionality leading up to and through extreme events” • Delivery of research results to users is not effective. • Interagency coordination is also lacking.

13. US-Japan Panel on Wind and Seismic Effects(Established nearly 40 years ago.) • Task Committee on Wind Engineering • Bilateral meeting in July 2006 resulting in the following tasks: • Application of computational fluid dynamics (CDF) to complex structures and urban areas • Comparing full-scale and model scale CFD • Downscaling wind observations for use in CDF and understanding wind structure around complex structures and complex built environment • Higher resolution data sets for windstorms • Develop methodology for predicting structural damage from landfalling tropical cyclones • Improved windstorm climatologies • Convene workshop between meteorologists and wind structural engineers to communicate needs of engineers for wind data and reveal what is available now and in the future for wind observations

14. NSB Report: Hurricane Warning – The Critical Need for a National Hurricane Research Initiative • “High Priority: Predicting storm surge, rainfall, and inland flooding from hurricanes and tropical storms…The impacts of flooding on community water supplies, ecosystems and the built infrastructure must be better understood promote and enforce more effective building practices.” • “High Priority: Interaction of hurricanes with engineered structures…engineered structures are vulnerable to damage from wind, precipitation and storm surge though the combined impacts are not well understood. Research therefore is needed to better understand fluid-structure interactions at fine spatial scales, with the coupling of atmospheric and land-surface/built infrastructure models essential for guiding the creation of improved building designs and construction codes in particularly vulnerable locations.” • High Priority: Assessing and improving the resilience of the built environment. A requirement exists fora national engineering assessment of coastal infrastructure – including levees, seawalls, drainage systems, bridges, water/sewage, power, and communications – to ascertain their level of vulnerability to hurricanes. Studies are needed to identify and prioritize the most cost-effective improvements and develop a national loss reduction strategy that addresses inevitable degradation of built infrastructure. Careful attention also should be paid in infrastructure research to existing building codes and the extent to which recent damage has been a result of non-compliance.

15. NIST-NOAA Disaster Resilient Communities Partnership • Improve risk-based storm surge and shallow water wave maps for the design of structures (Storm surge work is on-going.) • Develop Saffir-Simpson-type scale to predict structural damage potential (work emerging) • Use CDF to develop wind load databases

16. Shouldn’t these interagency/international efforts be coordinated? • To avoid duplication and to leverage resources • Been attempting to link WindHRP, US-Japan, and NIST-NOAA efforts • OSTP position is that the NSB plan be placed under WindHRP to avoid duplication. • Is there a role for OFCM? Any ideas? John.gaynor@noaa.gov