Welcome to brain Stuff production of iHeart Radio, Hey brain Stuff Lauren vocal bomb here. As. The Atlantic hurricane season began on June one nine and runs through November thirtieth, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association predicted a range of between nine and fifteen storms that would be big enough to merit names. That is, storms with winds of thirty nine miles per hour about sixty three kilometers per hour
or higher. Four to eight of these were predicted to become hurricanes, and two to four of those were forecast to become major hurricanes in category three, four, or five. That is what sustained winds of a hundred and eleven miles per hour or a hundred and seventy nine kilometers
per hour or higher. Those categories are from the SOFIA Simpson Hurricane Wind Scale, which explains the severity of damage that can be expected from each hurricane category based on the wind's ability to collapse roofs, walls, trees, and power infrastructure at different beads. To aid in forecasting efforts, meteorologists utilize visualizations called spaghetti models, also sometimes known as spahetti plots. To a lay person, spaghetti models look like well, a
bunch of spaghetti strands thrown against a wall. In reality, though, spahetti plots are a method of combining information from a variety of predictive models onto one map to come up with a picture of a hurricanes potential track. We spoke with Daniel J. Leathers, a professor and director of the Meteorology and Climatology Program at the University of Delaware. He also serves as Delaware State Climatologist and as a co
director of the Delaware Environmental Observing System. He explained each model that's used to predict hurricane paths and in many cases intensity can have that path plotted on a map. All of spaghetti plot does is take the results from all of these models and plot all of them on
the same map. To understand why spaghetti plots are important, you have to understand that there are a whole bunch of different modeling methods that are used to track hurricanes, and like presidential election polls, for example, they don't all produce the same results. The object of creating such a map, according to Leathers, is to see the extent to which all the different models agree. He said, oh, when the
paths are very similar to one another. This means that all the models are agreeing to a large extent about the future path of the storm. In contrast, if the individual plots are all over the place quote, then that says that there is great uncertainty in the models about where the storm will move in the future. Spetty plots are a way of seeing all of the model results at one time and not relying on just one model for a forecast. They are very helpful in conveying the
certainty or uncertainty of a forecast. The lines on the chart indicate the different paths projected by the various models, which have varying degrees of reliability. Leathers said. The models include dynamical models using the physics of the atmosp fear, statistical models, and in some cases analog models to predict
the coming movement of an individual storm. These models come from meteorological organizations from all across the globe of places like the National Weather Service, the British met Office, universities and so on. Some models are certainly thought to be better than others, they are very different in how they make predictions and in what they are best at. So what if any useful information can lay people get from looking at spaghetti plots, A Lether's explains the most useful
information is the certainty of the forecast. Again, if all the paths are very similar, the forecast certainty is high. If the paths are very different, the certainty is low. If there's a great spread in the forecast tracks, then that shows that the models are not doing a great job as a suite in figuring out where this particular storm is likely to move in the future. Some hurricane models can be run in a few seconds on an ordinary computer, while others may require hows of calculation by
a supercomputer. Spaghetti models have changed subtly over the years as computing power has improved and researchers have tweaked their models based on the great volumes of data we humans have been able to gather thanks to computers. Leathers says the approach has evolved as more and more hurricane models are run in real time, and as technology has allowed for putting these models together into a spaghetti plot in
a timely manner. He predicts that the number of models and their sophistication is likely to continue to grow in the years ahead. Today's episode were written by Patrick Jake Hager and produced by Tyler. Playing brain Stuff is a production of iHeart Radio's How Stuff Works. For more in this and lots of other sustained topics, visit our home planet,
how stuff Works dot com. And for more podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.