New Ways of Collecting Hurricane Data - Introducing the Easi Buoy

Mother Nature, every year she pounds the coastlines with hurricanes, causing millions of tons of the oceans water to flood our cities, contaminate our water systems, destroy our business and kill hundreds, even thousands of people. Each time that a hurricane strikes, scientists try to examine it and find out what makes this spiraling storm system so dangerous and possible use the information to warn coastlines in more detail.

Well, that technology is advancing thanks to Will Drennan and Neil Williams. They have developed a buoy that is 20 feet long and 10 feet wide that was designed by our own U.S. Navy. This buoy is even shaped like a boat and is built for extreme air sea interaction; hence the buoy's nickname The Easi.

Almost one million dollars has been provided for this buoy's development. This new technology will assist scientists in measuring the rate at which the sea sprays around storms evaporate. Sea spray is the spray of water that forms when ocean waves crash. So, what does the spray of water have to do with a hurricane? A lot, the droplets of water that kicked up by the seas actually lubricate the hurricane winds, which in turn, assist them in building up speed and makes the hurricane stronger. This seven and a half ton buoy is just waiting for a hurricane to hit it. The Easi is currently sitting 250 miles off Jacksonville, Florida's coast, right in the hurricane alley.

Hurricane buoys have been placed in many of the ocean's waters in order to measure hurricane wind, wave, barometric pressure, and air and sea temperatures to determine the hurricane's formation, as well as the maximum intensity and eye of the storm. However, many of the buoys are not built to survive Category 4 and 5 storms. But the Easi is a little bit different. The Easi was created to withstand the wrath of a Category 5 hurricane as well as have the ability to observe more complex processes or information.

A hurricane can reach up to eight miles into the air, as well as be up to 700 miles in diameter. Warm water, as well as sea spray, assists in giving the storm its power, Easi will be able to monitor the heat temperatures, unlike previous buoys.

Using this new technology will help the scientists be more accurate in their forecasts. Seasonal hurricane predictions are just that, predictions. However, with the Easi's observations, it may have the ability to give accurate forecasts.

The Easi will not be alone in the observation of hurricanes, meteorologists are also constantly improving computer models that will more effectively create warnings that will aim to better determine where the storm will hit and with the help of Easi, how powerful they will be.

Government meteorologists are calling for up to 16 named storms this hurricane season, with a possibility of five of them to be intense. Looks like Easi is going to be put to the test!

In conclusion, with this type of teamwork, and as long as Easi does what she is designed to do, weather persons will keep improving forecast accuracy as well as increased warning time to those that are in the path of the oncoming hurricane.