Hurricane Modeling and Damage Estimation

En este trabajo realizamos una tarea fundamentalmente de recopilación informativa para hacer un recuento de las políticas públicas en El Salvador relacionadas con la gestión del riesgo y las medidas preventivas y de organización comunitaria frente a vulnerabilidades en su territorio y hábitat derivadas del cambio climático y actividad sísmica, en especial los desastres que tienen su origen en huracanes, ciclones, inundaciones y terremotos. Recogemos las deliberaciones y opiniones de los funcionarios salvadoreños en el marco de reuniones regionales recientes relativas a la prevención del riesgo y vulnerabilidad de la región centroamericana y en especial de El Salvador.

What happens to property values after a catastrophic climate event such as flood, or wildfire? This study examines how North American Real Estate markets respond after catastrophic events. The study explores the present and future risks to property valuation and insuranability. The study concludes with a recommendation for the creation of a Real Estate Climate Risk Index, as an intervention for creating market stability in the face of increasing frequency and scale of property damage from climate events.

Drawing on more than twenty years of research and long-term in-depth field experience in the Neotropics, this article argues for an indigenous methodology for predicting the arrival of hurricanes in the Caribbean. The archaeological site under study is Anse à la Gourde on Guadeloupe (French West Indies), here discussed in conjunction with a theoretical underpinning in Indigenous Amazonian cosmologies and ethnoastronomy.

Unexpected events and abrupt changes have profound impacts on individuals, organizations and communities. L'Aquila, Carwoola, Katrina, and Kaikoura have become familiar words in the everyday life of some communities while others remain ignorant about these natural disasters. Undoubtedly, earthquakes, tsunamis, floods, bush fires, hurricanes, droughts and heatwaves have become common features of our social fabric, while global change, including increased urbanisation and climate change, is altering the environmental context of disasters. Answers to the questions of how do we prepare?, how do we cope?, and how do we respond?, remain diverse across individuals and destinations, and are sometimes as unpredictable as the events themselves. In the face of natural disasters, issues of mitigation, preparedness, response and recovery (Mileti, 1999) as well as the direct and indirect impacts themselves are relevant for all tourism stakeholders including tourists and tourism organizations and the wider tourism system. This call for expression of interest for book chapters has the objective of bringing together both academic and practitioner perspectives on managing disasters through a five volume series of books, each focusing on a specific type of disaster. The five edited books will be part of the " Aspects of Tourism " series published by Channel View, with an anticipated publication date of the last quarter of 2018. The theme of each edited book is provided below:

At this point, Japan is being attacked by a super typhoon, but my bubble has protected the area that far exceeds my area. The color has changed and is easy to understand.
BUBBLE TECH IS PROVING THAT US HUMANS COLLECTIVELY ARE THE CREATOR GODS OF ALL THAT WE SEE.

As they exist in their contemporaneous hubris!
Donations accepted at->https://1drv.ms/u/s!ApcspsqQAspIimwqeiBIin8ktjZN?e=e8eUQ0

https://beyondtribalism.blogspot.com/2022/05/as-they-exist-in-their-contemporaneous.html

Have what ever reasons you choose.
The reality and depths of the wretched destitution and unwanted misery reside in the fabric of this soulless civic, seeking the solution which their pain has numbed to an anesthetized dystopia avoidance for fear of losing this miserable existence's sensations-the sum total of their cherished being.

The sacred vernacular and colloquial that's used more for signifying and social posturing that became a cultural censor and consensus, than a clarifying analysis of 'what is', it is bastardized and prostituted worse than the human representations of those terms.

More insidious is the herd "bravado" that exists in defining what and who is by that vain and feckless 'sacred vernacular and colloquial' that allows shows of social consensus of performance cultural angst for comfort in the absence of engagement in moralistic grand standing in amoralistic circumstances!

As some have asked of my identity...

But first, to answer the comments of my verbalisms. It can be prose, which gives neutered, reductionist facts of instruction-or hopefully-information. Or it can be an abstract art that affects and forces us to no longer be detached, but emotionally engaged. I see that an "artist" is unconcerned of the value others will place on what's been created. Much as the MGM logo states, ARS GRATIA ARTIS [art for the sake of art], I attempt to cohere, if not adhere to the spirit of that dictum.

I do it for those souls living in muttering resentment to their secular overlords leverage of economic or emotional power over them. I do it for those inspiring souls, who-for me-were prematurely aborted by their Icarus lifestyles that were a misfit for their time and place. For these and others who aren't allowed or unable to have such a platform to procreate into the moment, I do this.
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Speaking of 'procreation', I will address the defamations about my 'identity'. Unlike those who bind themselves to their provincial place in this time and space, I've come to see myself as an extrapolated, metamorphic reincarnation of the history of my birth date's agelessness heralding of endings/beginning of things. I am the progeny of the eruption of Vesuvius which buried Pompeii, the bringing to end of Rome by the Goths, the brutality done to the Huguenots in France, the winds of Hurricane Andrew upon the shores of southern Florida-the announcement/pronouncement of the change's advent-historically and seasonally. What dominated before was no more. I unconsciously, at first, and now more compulsively consciously now am and have been that irrepressible new moment which is an inherent challenge to those of smug presumption of what is in form and substance. THAT IS WHO I AM, beyond the identifiable an from the anonymous and anomalous.
                                      ---------------------------------
https://www.classifiedads.com/churches/3d5wjxbcd3c6z

Climate change impacts are affecting property values across the North American continent. Property losses from both insurable and uninsurable climate hazard related sources are increasing annually. This study aims to discover property value impacts across the market and to understand future impacts of climate hazard on North American real estate values. Property value impacts of climate-risk are evaluated with a broad market approach to understanding the ways site improvement losses (buildings), and property (land) devaluation occur in relations to increases in catastrophic loss, as a result of climate-risk. The research points to urgent need for innovation in the housing sector. The research reveals patterns that demand industry and government attention and which demonstrate that the homeowner is the most vulnerable stakeholder. Recommendations are offered as next steps; recommendations are made for helping homeowners adapt to emerging climate-risk challenges. Key words: climate ...

The paper illustrates a probabilistic methodology for assessing the vulnerability of existing r.c. buildings withlimited ductility capacity and retrofitted by means of dissipative braces. The methodology is based on thedevelopment of single component and system fragility curves before and after the retrofit. The proposed approachallows to highlight the possible changes in the most significant collapse modalities before and after the retrofit andto evaluate the effectiveness of the retrofit by taking into account the probabilistic properties of the seismicbehaviour of the considered systems.A benchmark 2-dimensional reinforced concrete frame with low ductility capacity is considered as case study. Theframe is designed for gravity-loads only and does not comply with modern anti-seismic code requirements. It isretrofitted by introducing elasto-plastic dissipative braces designed for different levels of their target base-shearcapacity, following a design method involving the pushover analysis of the system before and after retrofit. Theobtained results show that the use of braces yields a significant increase in the seismic capacity, though anincreased dispersion of the behaviour is observed in the retrofitted system.

Land-use change is the main cause of deforestation and degradation of tropical forest in Mexico. Frequently, these lands are abandoned leading to a mosaic of natural vegetation in secondary succession. Further degradation of the natural vegetation in these lands could be exacerbated by stochastic catastrophic events such as hurricanes. Information on the impact of human disturbance parallel to natural disturbance has not yet been evaluated for faunal assemblages in tropical dry forests. To evaluate the response of herpetofaunal assemblages to the interaction of human and natural disturbances, we used information of pre- and post-hurricane herpetofaunal assemblages inhabiting different successional stages (pasture, early forest, young forest, intermediate forest, and old growth forest) of dry forest. Herpetofaunal assemblages were surveyed in all successional stages two years before and two years after the hurricane Jova that hit the Pacific Coast of Mexico on October 2011. We registered 4093 individuals of 61 species. Overall, there were only slight effects of successional stage, hurricane Jova or the interaction between them on abundance, observed species richness and diversity of the herpetofauna. However, we found marked changes in estimated richness and composition of frogs, lizards, and snakes among successional stages in response to hurricane Jova. Modifications in vegetation structure as result of hurricane pass promoted particular changes in each successional stage and taxonomic group (anurans, lizards, and snakes). Secondary forests at different stages of succession may attenuate the negative effects of an intense, short-duration, and low-frequency natural disturbance such as hurricane Jova on successional herpetofaunal trajectories and species turnover.

Land-use change is the main cause of deforestation and degradation of tropical forest in Mexico. Frequently, these lands are abandoned leading to a mosaic of natural vegetation in secondary succession. Further degradation of the natural vegetation in these lands could be exacerbated by stochastic catastrophic events such as hurricanes. Information on the impact of human disturbance parallel to natural disturbance has not yet been evaluated for faunal assemblages in tropical dry forests. To evaluate the response of herpetofaunal assemblages to the interaction of human and natural disturbances, we used information of pre-and post-hurricane herpetofaunal assemblages inhabiting different successional stages (pasture, early forest, young forest, intermediate forest, and old growth forest) of dry forest. Her-petofaunal assemblages were surveyed in all successional stages two years before and two years after the hurricane Jova that hit the Pacific Coast of Mexico on October 2011. We registered 4093 individuals of 61 species. Overall, there were only slight effects of successional stage, hurricane Jova or the interaction between them on abundance, observed species richness and diversity of the herpeto-fauna. However, we found marked changes in estimated richness and composition of frogs, lizards, and snakes among successional stages in response to hurricane Jova. Modifications in vegetation structure as result of hurricane pass promoted particular changes in each successional stage and taxonomic group (anurans, lizards, and snakes). Secondary forests at different stages of succession may attenuate the negative effects of an intense, short-duration, and low-frequency natural disturbance such as hurricane Jova on successional herpetofaunal trajectories and species turnover.

The purpose of this document is to provide an assessment of the damage done to the fisheries sector of Antigua and Barbuda following the passage of Hurricane Earl, a category-two hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Wind Scale, on Monday, 30 August 2010. Hurricane Earl was the third hurricane of the 2010 Atlantic hurricane season and it packed maximum sustained winds of 100 miles per hour (161 km / hour) when it passed the islands. According to the Antigua and Barbuda Meteorological Services, about 7 inches (178 mm) of rain fell across both islands, resulting in widespread flooding.

By logging in the past, humans can determine current tree population structures, but fast stump decomposition makes difficult to falsify that for Amazonian Rainforests. We reconstructed land-use histories and surveyed trees ≥ 10 cm diameter at breast height on three 1-ha plots (K1, K2, and K6) in Kühbergl, South Tyrolean Alps as we did for four plots in Atacapi, Ecuador (plots A, B, C, and D). Storm Vaia (October 27 –November 1, 2018) stroke Kübergl providing dated evidence of mass tree-mortality on plot K6. We used K6 as control for comparing its pre- and post-storm population structures with the ones of four Amazonian, and three Alpine species where Vaia did not kill trees (Kolmogorov-Smirnov tests). When compared with K6’s Picea abies, the following species had size distributions similar to post-storm, but not to pre-storm situation. Amazonian: Piptocoma discolor, Vochysia bracelineae (plots B and D), Miconia decurrens (plots B and C), and Pseudobombax sp (plot C). Alpine: Larix decidua (plot K1) and Picea abies (plot K2). Storms do not occur in Atacapi, where logging is a common practice. That makes plausible that discrete events of compulsive logging during secondary succession made Amazonian population structures to look similar to K6’s P. abies. Logging is forbidden in Kühbergl, but storms are common there. Thus, the current population structures of Larix decidua (plot K1) and Picea abies (plot K2) should be legacies of storms before Vaia. Looking into tree populations’ history can impulse research for answering some basic questions of Ecology: what alters population structures, and which population structuring processes are more influential than others.

A way is substantiated for detecting new large-scale vortex instability in the tropical atmosphere. The instability may occur several hours or even several dozens of hours before the formation of a tropical depression or tropical storm. The diagnosis of instability was developed on the basis of data from idealized cloud-resolving atmospheric simulation for tropical cyclogenesis. It is suggested how the evolving instability may be traced by combining highresolution numerical modeling and GOES Imagery. As an illustration, it is speculated and discussed that the instability may have emerged in future Hurricane Isaias (2020) when it had a status of Potential Tropical Cyclone for 36 hours before it was diagnosed as Tropical Storm.

The frequency and intensity of hurricanes are likely to increase in the Caribbean due to climate change, potentially threatening the long-term conservation of biodiversity in vulnerable island ecosystems. The effects of hurricanes were assessed for the understory forest birds of Cozumel Island during the first and second year after two consecutive hurricanes (Emily and Wilma) struck the island in July and October of 2005. Post-hurricanes values were compared to pre-hurricanes values for summer and winter bird assemblages. A total of 2,504 individuals of 45 species (29 resident and 16 migrants) were captured using mist nets. Strong negative effects of the hurricanes were detected during the first winter season, that is, 3 months following the second hurricane, with significantly lower mean values per site for the number of individuals, the number of species, and the percentages of migratory individuals and species. During the second winter (16 months after the hurricanes), parameter values of the bird assemblages were similar to pre-hurricane values. Response variables showed no effects of hurricanes in the case of summer bird assemblages (either 8 or 21 months after the hurricanes). Yet, when we carried out ordinations of the samples, taking into consideration the bird species and their relative abundances, we found that in both winter and summer seasons, bird assemblages for the three sampling periods (pre-hurricanes, first year and second year after the hurricanes) could be clearly distinguished. Management strategies for hurricane-prone areas are recommended, in particular for diverse insular ecosystems highly threatened by the synergistic effects of natural and anthropogenic disturbances.

The purpose of this document is to provide a preliminary assessment of the damage done to the fisheries sector of Antigua and Barbuda following the passage of Hurricane Irma, a Category 5 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson Wind Scale, on September 05 – 06, 2017. Hurricane Irma was the second major storm of the 2017 Atlantic Hurricane Season with peak intensity of 185 miles per hour (295 kilometres per hour) winds and minimum pressure of 914 millibars (27.0 inches of mercury); making it the second most intense tropical cyclone worldwide so far for 2017 and ties it as the second, strongest Atlantic hurricane by wind speed, surpassed only by Hurricane Allen of 1980 which reached wind speeds of 190 miles per hour (305 kilometres per hour). According to data from the National Hurricane Center, Hurricane Irma had the second longest duration (3 days, 3 hours) as a Category 5 hurricane on record. Assessment was limited to damages as defined by United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (UN-ECLAC) as “total or partial destruction of physical assets existing in the affected area” (total or partial damage of vessels, engines, equipment, gears, infrastructure, fingerlings, etc.). Losses as defined by UN-ECLAC as “changes in economic flows arising from the disaster” (e.g., loss due to decline in capture production or higher input cost for aquaculture) were not considered. As a preliminary assessment, the values presented with respect to damages are cursory (up to September 30, 2017) and will represent an underestimation of the “true cost” since most fishers are in the process of resuming fishing operations (i.e., returning to sea to locate fish traps or pots set prior to the Hurricane Irma).

The paper illustrates a probabilistic methodology for assessing the vulnerability of existing reinforced concrete (RC) buildings with limited ductility capacity retrofitted by dissipative braces. The aim is to highlight the most important parameters controlling the capacity of these coupled systems and specific aspects concerning the response uncertainties. The proposed methodology is based on the development of fragility curves by performing incremental dynamic analysis within OpenSees and on the use of local engineering demand parameters. The capabilities of the methodology are tested by considering a benchmark RC frame designed for gravity-loads only and retrofitted by introducing elasto-plastic dissipative braces. The results show the effectiveness of the methodology and of the employed simulation software in describing the change of failure modalities due to retrofit.

Historical records indicate that four of these hurricanes (1635, 1638, 1815, and 1938) and hurricane Carol, a strong category 2 storm in 1954, produced significant storm surges (Ͼ3 m) in southern Rhode Island. Storm surges of this magnitude can overtop barrier islands, removing sediments from the beach and nearshore environment and depositing overwash fans across back-barrier marshes, lakes, and lagoons. In a regime of rising sea level, accumulation of marsh, lake, or lagoon sediments on top of overwash deposits will preserve a record of overwash deposition.

First part of a three part poem about "Hurricane Katrina" in 2005, it is a description of how hurricanes form and in general the atmosphere of New Orleans and Louisiana and the natural environment prior to the hurricane's arrival from Linstroth's forthcoming book, 'Epochal Reckonings' (release date November 2020).

The economical evaluation of the benefits of cloud migration versus the decision to buy and manage the storage facilities in house is essential for the migration decision. Deterministic models have been proposed in the past, which fail to account for the essentially random nature of any future quantity involved in the decision. The random nature of future events also implies the insurgence of risks when the decision taken turns out to be wrong. Here we adopt a probabilistic model and employ it to assess the risk associated to either decision over an extended time period. We adopt the Value-at-Risk as a risk metric, and compare two decision variables, namely the mean and the median Differential Net Present Value. We show that though the two decision variables bear the same risk for most values of the range of leasing prices, the mean Differential Net Present Value abates the Value-at-Risk even by as much as 60% in the small region of leasing prices where there is large uncertainty between the two alternatives.

Frequency and duration of floods are analyzed using the global flood database of the Dartmouth Flood Observatory (DFO) to explore evidence of trends during 1985-2015 at global and latitudinal scales. Three classes of flood duration (i.e., short: 1-7, moderate: 8-20, and long: 21 days and above) are also considered for this analysis. The nonparametric Mann-Kendall trend analysis is used to evaluate three hypotheses addressing potential monotonic trends in the frequency of flood, moments of duration, and frequency of specific flood duration types. We also evaluated if trends could be related to large-scale atmospheric teleconnections using a generalized linear model framework. Results show that flood frequency and the tails of the flood duration (long duration) have increased at both the global and the latitudinal scales. In the tropics, floods have increased 4-fold since the 2000s. This increase is 2.5-fold in the north midlatitudes. However, much of the trend in frequency and duration of the floods can be placed within the long-term climate variability context since the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, North Atlantic Oscillation, and Pacific Decadal Oscillation were the main atmospheric teleconnections explaining this trend. There is no monotonic trend in the frequency of short-duration floods across all the global and latitudinal scales. There is a significant increasing trend in the annual median of flood durations globally and each latitudinal belt, and this trend is not related to these teleconnections. While the DFO data come with a certain level of epistemic uncertainty due to imprecision in the estimation of floods, overall, the analysis provides insights for understanding the frequency and persistence in hydrologic extremes and how they relate to changes in the climate, organization of global and local dynamical systems, and country-scale socioeconomic factors.

Satellite Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and RADARSAT-1 (radar) satellite image data collected before and after the landfall of Hurricane Katrina in the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area on the Louisiana-Mississippi border, USA, were applied to the study of forested wetland impact and recovery. We documented the overall similarity in the radar and optical satellite mapping of impact and recovery patterns and highlighted some unique differences that could be used to provide consistent and relevant ecological monitoring. Satellite optical data transformed to a canopy foliage index (CFI) indicated a dramatic decrease in canopy cover immediately after the storm, which then recovered rapidly in the Taxodium distichum (baldcypress) and Nyssa aquatica (water tupelo) forest. Although CFI levels in early October indicated rapid foliage recovery, the abnormally high radar responses associated with the cypress forest suggested a persistent poststorm difference in canopy structure. Impact and recovery mapping results showed that even though cypress forests experienced very high wind speeds, damage was largely limited to foliage loss. Bottomland hardwoods, experiencing progressively lower wind speeds further inland, suffered impacts ranging from increased occurrences of downed trees in the south to partial foliage loss in the north. In addition, bottomland hardwood impact and recovery patterns suggested that impact severity was associated with a difference in stand structure possibly related to environmental conditions that were not revealed in the prehurricane 25-m optical and radar image analyses.

The operational capabilities of low-resolution satellite instruments, such as SPOT VEGETATION, MODIS, and NOAA AVHRR, make real-time and near-real time Earth Observation (EO) data indispensable for monitoring world vegetation resources. The data continuity of the SPOT VEGETATION mission is to be ensured by PROBA-V (“V” standing for “Vegetation”). The present study aims to reveal the potentialities of the PROBA-V mission and its advantages as compared to SPOT VEGETATION based on a comparison of ...

The Rio Grande Valley (RGV) has been impacted by various hurricanes throughout history. While Hurricane evacuation has been studied extensively in other contexts, there is limited systematic research on the warning and response to a large-scale severe weather event in South Texas. This study attempts to understand the evacuation decision-making behavior of Southern residents in the event of a Hurricane making landfall over the Rio Grande Valley. The study uses an online survey questionnaire with 1060 participants: 275 students attending the University of Texas-Rio Grande Valley and the remaining 785 are members of the community. Throughout the course of the study, information was gathered about selected elements: demographic characteristics, living conditions, the following and awareness of authority recommendations, decision maker roles, reasons for not wanting to leave a disaster-prone area facing an emergency, perception of a safe place, and expected help from both, governments a...

collected before and after the landfall of Hurricane Katrina in the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area on the Louisiana-Mississippi border, USA, were applied to the study of forested wetland impact and recovery. We documented the overall similarity in the radar and optical satellite mapping of impact and recovery patterns and highlighted some unique differences that could be used to provide consistent and relevant ecological monitoring. Satellite optical data transformed to a canopy foliage index (CFI) indicated a dramatic decrease in canopy cover immediately after the storm, which then recovered rapidly in the Taxodium distichum (baldcypress) and Nyssa aquatica (water tupelo) forest. Although CFI levels in early October indicated rapid foliage recovery, the abnormally high radar responses associated with the cypress forest suggested a persistent poststorm difference in canopy structure. Impact and recovery mapping results showed that even though cypress forests experienced very h...

Satellite Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and RADARSAT-1 (radar) satellite image data collected before and after the landfall of Hurricane Katrina in the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area on the Louisiana-Mississippi border, USA, were applied to the study of forested wetland impact and recovery. We documented the overall similarity in the radar and optical satellite mapping of impact and recovery patterns

Satellite Landsat Thematic Mapper (TM) and RADARSAT-1 (radar) satellite image data collected before and after the landfall of Hurricane Katrina in the Pearl River Wildlife Management Area on the Louisiana-Mississippi border, USA, were applied to the study of forested wetland impact and recovery. We documented the overall similarity in the radar and optical satellite mapping of impact and recovery patterns

The frequency and intensity of hurricanes are likely to increase in the Caribbean due to climate change, potentially threatening the long-term conservation of biodiversity in vulnerable island ecosystems. The effects of hurricanes were assessed for the understory forest birds of Cozumel Island during the first and second year after two consecutive hurricanes (Emily and Wilma) struck the island in July and October of 2005. Post-hurricanes values were compared to pre-hurricanes values for summer and winter bird assemblages. A total of 2,504 individuals of 45 species (29 resident and 16 migrants) were captured using mist nets. Strong negative effects of the hurricanes were detected during the first winter season, that is, 3 months following the second hurricane, with significantly lower mean values per site for the number of individuals, the number of species, and the percentages of migratory individuals and species. During the second winter (16 months after the hurricanes), parameter values of the bird assemblages were similar to pre-hurricane values. Response variables showed no effects of hurricanes in the case of summer bird assemblages (either 8 or 21 months after the hurricanes). Yet, when we carried out ordinations of the samples, taking into consideration the bird species and their relative abundances, we found that in both winter and summer seasons, bird assemblages for the three sampling periods (pre-hurricanes, first year and second year after the hurricanes) could be clearly distinguished. Management strategies for hurricane-prone areas are recommended, in particular for diverse insular ecosystems highly threatened by the synergistic effects of natural and anthropogenic disturbances.

The paper illustrates a probabilistic methodology for assessing the vulnerability of existing r.c. buildings withlimited ductility capacity and retrofitted by means of dissipative braces. The methodology is based on thedevelopment of single component and system fragility curves before and after the retrofit. The proposed approachallows to highlight the possible changes in the most significant collapse modalities before and after the retrofit andto evaluate the effectiveness of the retrofit by taking into account the probabilistic properties of the seismicbehaviour of the considered systems.A benchmark 2-dimensional reinforced concrete frame with low ductility capacity is considered as case study. Theframe is designed for gravity-loads only and does not comply with modern anti-seismic code requirements. It isretrofitted by introducing elasto-plastic dissipative braces designed for different levels of their target base-shearcapacity, following a design method involving the pushover an...

The frequency and intensity of hurricanes are likely to increase in the Caribbean due to climate change, potentially threatening the long-term conservation of biodiversity in vulnerable island ecosystems. The effects of hurricanes were assessed for the understory forest birds of Cozumel Island during the first and second year after two consecutive hurricanes (Emily and Wilma) struck the island in July and October of 2005. Post-hurricanes values were compared to pre-hurricanes values for summer and winter bird assemblages. A total of 2,504 individuals of 45 species (29 resident and 16 migrants) were captured using mist nets. Strong negative effects of the hurricanes were detected during the first winter season, that is, 3 months following the second hurricane, with significantly lower mean values per site for the number of individuals, the number of species, and the percentages of migratory individuals and species. During the second winter (16 months after the hurricanes), parameter values of the bird assemblages were similar to pre-hurricane values. Response variables showed no effects of hurricanes in the case of summer bird assemblages (either 8 or 21 months after the hurricanes). Yet, when we carried out ordinations of the samples, taking into consideration the bird species and their relative abundances, we found that in both winter and summer seasons, bird assemblages for the three sampling periods (pre-hurricanes, first year and second year after the hurricanes) could be clearly distinguished. Management strategies for hurricane-prone areas are recommended, in particular for diverse insular ecosystems highly threatened by the synergistic effects of natural and anthropogenic disturbances.

Hurricane Andrew struck south Florida on August 24, 1992 and went on to strike Louisiana on August 26th.  The following week, the lead author conducted aerial and ground damage surveys in both states.  Additional detailed inspections were performed on hundreds of site specific buildings over the next several months.  This paper summarizes common building construction problems found during the evaluation of storm damage.

Solar power can improve the quality of life and reduce dependency on traditional energies that are a significant source of pollution and global warming. Solar panels are common devices used for collecting solar energy. To balance between sustainability and resilience, it is essential to provide an accurate estimate of the design wind loads for the solar panels. Traditionally design wind loads for buildings and other structures are obtained using building codes and standards. The solar panels represent a relatively recent technology and indeed there is no complete guidance ready for codification of wind loads on these types of structures. Available wind tunnel data show discrepancies in wind loads on solar panels, owing to inconsistent model scales and test flows, among other factors. To eliminate such discrepancies in the test results and to allow for accurate wind load estimation, the current paper investigates the geometric scale and the inflow turbulence characteristics as potential causes of high uncertainties. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations are employed and results are compared with available wind tunnel data, as a complementary tool with a potential to simulate wind loads at full-scale. The results show that the geometric scale is a primary reason for the discrepancies in peak wind loads, which can be avoided by adapting the inflow turbulence and using a proper testing protocol. The results show an evidence of the correctness of a hypothesis that the lack of large-scale turbulence can dramatically affect peak wind loads on test objects. Consequently, recommendations are articulated regarding the best usage of the available wind load estimation tools. This is expected to lead to consistent and accurate results from wind tunnel testing and CFD simulations, a crucial step toward codification of wind loads on solar panels.

Due to the ability of malicious worms to spread quickly over the Internet, detection and reaction mechanisms are needed in order to stop the progress of the infection process. Existing worm thwarting techniques do not take into account the false negative and false positive probabilities when implementing the responses. In this paper, we study the impact of the efficiency of the worm detection process on the selected responses. To this purpose, we develop a cost-benefit model allowing the representation of the impact caused by the worm propagation as well as the outcome of the potential reaction. We show that our approach enables the selection of the convenient security solution, especially with respect to the reaction time, which is not considered by the traditional worm response techniques. The efficiency of the proposed approach is corroborated by practical experiments.

http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpls/abs_all.jsp?arnumber=5893862&tag=1

Historical records indicate that four of these hurricanes (1635, 1638, 1815, and 1938) and hurricane Carol, a strong category 2 storm in 1954, produced significant storm surges (Ͼ3 m) in southern Rhode Island. Storm surges of this magnitude can overtop barrier islands, removing sediments from the beach and nearshore environment and depositing overwash fans across back-barrier marshes, lakes, and lagoons. In a regime of rising sea level, accumulation of marsh, lake, or lagoon sediments on top of overwash deposits will preserve a record of overwash deposition.