HRI Weekly Seminar Speaker - Jonathan Zawislak, Ph.D.

Our HRI weekly seminar speaker this week is Dr. Jonathan Zawislak, Research Assistant Professor at Florida International University. His talk titled “The Science Behind Hurricane Hunting: How Observations are Advancing Our Knowledge of Hurricanes” will be held on Friday, February 24th at 3:30pm.

Abstract

Although scientists have been flying hurricanes since the late 1940s, the recent couple of decades has seen a “golden age” in airborne hurricane science. The NOAA Hurricane Hunters, and airborne campaigns led by NASA and other agencies, have contributed numerous research missions and critical data, which has advanced our knowledge on hurricane structure and intensity change processes, and improved track and intensity forecasts. These aircraft have carried state-of-art instrumentation, which collectively has allowed scientists to examine the storm structure on multiple time and spatial scales. One such example is the NASA Global Hawk, a high-altitude, long-duration unmanned aircraft, flown over Atlantic storms since 2012. A decades-long record of space-borne instruments has also enabled scientists to investigate hurricane structure, particularly the rainfall characteristics of the storm. This talk will review the state of hurricane science today, how airborne and space-borne instruments are being used to further understand the hurricane structure and processes, and what the future holds for hurricane observing strategies and technologies.