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Extreme Wind Speed Data Sets: Hurricane Wind Speeds

Data Origin This section contains data sets of simulated 1-minute hurricane wind speeds at 10m above ground in open terrain near the coastline. For details, see M. E. Batts, E. Simiu and L. R. Russell (1980), "Hurricane Wind Speeds in the United States," Journal of the Structural Division, Vol. 106, Issue 10, pp. 2001-2016.
Structure of the Data Files There are 55 files with data for locations ranging from milepost 150 (near Port Isabel, TX) to milepost 2850 (near Portland, ME), spaced at 50 nautical mile intervals. The structure of each data file is as follows:
  • Line 1: Milepost identifier, plus other information not needed for the analysis program.

  • Line 2: Blank, usually. In some files, the milepost number is repeated here.

  • Line 3: URATE and NSTRMS. URATE is the estimated annual rate of occurrence of hurricanes at this milepost, and NSTRMS is the number of simulated storms used to create the data. For all datasets included in this section, NSTRMS=999.

  • Lines 4-1003: The windspeed data for each of the NSTRMS simulated storms. There are a total of 18 numbers on each line. The first 16 are the maximum windspeeds in 16 specified directions, beginning with NNE and moving clockwise to N. The next number is the maximum windspeed for ANY direction (i.e., the largest of the previous speeds).

    The wind speeds are 1-min speeds in knots at 10 m above open terrain near the coastline.

NOTE: From the first 17 numbers of each line, the respective mean hourly wind speeds in meters per second at 10 m above ground over open terrain near the coastline are obtained via multiplication by the factor [0.447 m/s/mph x 1.15 mph/nmi x(1/1.24)].

The final number (18th) number in each line is the storm identifier (see the map).

Location Map Milepost Map

Locator map with coastal distance intervals (mileposts) marked, in nautical miles. From F. Ho, R. Schwerdt, and H. Goodyear, Some Climatolgical Characteristics of Hurricanes and Tropical Storms, Gulf and East Coasts of the United States, NOAA Technical Report NWS 15, Washington, DC, 1975.

Available Datasets The following is the list of simulated hurricane data sets. You can also download all of the files as a single zip file. Note that if you unzip this file on a Unix/Linux platform, you should use the "zip -a" option in order to obtain the correct "LF/CR" convention.

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Date created: 05/02/2005
Last updated: 04/26/2023
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