Reshaping Warning Presentations

National Hurricane Center’s Track Forecast Cone will have a new look this August

The center of the storm is no longer designed to be the center of attention in the National Hurricane Center’s new Track Forecast Cone.

Instead, watches and warnings will be at the forefront when the experimental cone debuts in August—so Southwest Floridians can know when to take swift action during a hurricane.

“If your area gets highlighted in the warning, it means it’s your last warning,” says John Cangialosi, senior hurricane specialist at the National Hurricane Center. That means it’s time to “get everything done and go to a place now where you’re going to ride the storm out.”

People in inland areas of Southwest Florida will now be able to see when winds, storm surges, and other serious effects will affect them. Highlighting clear risks beyond coastal neighborhoods can make a life-or-death difference for natural catastrophes such as 2022’s Hurricane Ian, which produced damaging storm surge, winds, and freshwater flooding, and claimed some 150 lives in Florida.

“Even though areas were in warning [during Hurricane Ian, people] were still like, ‘Well, maybe we’re not going to be in the worst of it,’ or they were still thinking about nuances,” Cangialosi says. “People have looked at the previous cone, and their eyes have been just attached to the dots on the cone, the middle of the cone. There’s been a distraction away from the watches and warnings, which are what is more actionable.”

Previously, the cone emphasized the coast because that’s within NHC’s jurisdiction, leaving other weather forecast offices mainly responsible for inland updates.

“We realized we can’t ask users to go to different places to get pieces of information they’re looking for, so we built a product where we could read everything all in one place, and we’re just going to make a very visible public product out of that information,” Cangialosi says.

Viewers can expect watches and warnings to be colored in on the experimental cone, switching the order of the previous design.

“The experimental cone puts the actionable impacts up front and uncertainty more in the background,” Cangialosi says.

Approximately 67% of the time, the center of the storm falls in the cone, and up to 33% of the time, it falls out of the cone, according to NHC statistics, Cangialosi said. “But, it doesn’t tell you where the rain is going to be, where the strongest winds are going to be, or where the storm surge is going to be.”

The forecast cone will be available on the National Hurricane Center’s website at nhc.noaa.gov. Residents should start checking the site about a week out as a tropical storm threatens their area while solidifying supplies and a hurricane preparedness plan.

“Once your area is under the gun, we want you to check back every six hours, four times a day, because that’s how often the cone is going to be updated,” Cangialosi says.

If residents are within the cone but the area is not colored in, no specific action is required, Cangialosi continued. Once the area is colored in, “that is the time to really start ramping up preparedness, especially if it’s a hurricane watch or a storm surge watch.”

Residents under a storm surge watch will likely need to evacuate, according to Cangialosi. “If you are in a hurricane watch, you probably don’t need to evacuate, but you need to prepare your home, family, and pets, and everything else you have to take care of.”

Since the updated cone is still new, NHC is also making the old design available this hurricane season. This could help in case of any technical hiccups or delays.

Cangialosi recommended checking national weather service forecast offices and weather.gov for area-specific information for added clarity.

NHC is welcoming feedback around its new cone this season, particularly from core partners such as the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“We want to make sure it is clear and understandable as people get used to it. Maybe the colors will change, maybe the graphics will look different, or maybe we will find that it doesn’t work at all,” Cangialosi says. “So, we’re going to collect feedback and refine it for the final version, which is likely going to be set for 2025.”