Development of a Probabilistic Insurable Hurricane Loss Model
Sponsor:  Florida Department of Insurance, 2001-2004

Project Description:  The Florida Public Hurricane Loss Projection Model (FPHLPM) is a multi-university effort to quantify the expected insurable losses to residential structures in the state of Florida due to hurricane wind damage. Risk will be determined in terms of probabilistically quantified damage to critical structural components as a function of peak wind speed. A distribution of likely damage to various components (roof, windows, etc.) will be evaluated for a series of structural models that represent the majority of Florida coastal residential construction. The project is sponsored by the Florida Department of Insurance. The four major components of the model are: 1) a hurricane wind model headed by Mark Powell and researchers from FSU, 2) a structural damage prediction model headed by Jean-Paul Pinelli at FIT, 3) a financial/actuarial team headed by Shahid Hamid at FIU, and 4) a computer platform development team headed by Shu-Ching Chen at FIU.

Principal Participants:
            University of Florida:      
                                                Kurt Gurley (faculty, damage modeling)
                                                Anne Cope (Ph.D. candidate)

            Florida Institute of Technology:
                                                Jean-Paul Pinelli (faculty, damage modeling)
                                                Chelakara Subramanian (faculty, damage modeling)
                                                Liang Zhang (M.S. may 2003)

            Florida International University:
                                                Shahid Hamid (faculty, project director)
                                                Shu-Ching Chen (faculty, software platform development)
                                                Sneh Gulati (faculty, statistics)

            Florida State University:
                                                T.N. Krishnamurti (faculty, meteorology - wind model)

            NOAA:
                                                Mark Powell (Hurricane Research Division, wind model)

            Florida Department of Insurance:
                                                Howard Eaglefeld


Hurricane Loss Reduction Consortium:  Wind and Structural Engineering Initiative
Sponsor:  National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST)

Principal Participants:  NIST, Clemson (lead), University of Florida, Johns Hopkins, University of Illinois, Virginia Polytechnic and Sate University, University of Notre Dame

Project Description:  The goal of the proposed consortium effort is to significantly strengthen the scientific and engineering basis for measures that seek to reduce losses from hurricane events (and wind storms) striking the United States.  This goal will be accomplished through a series of coordinated research activities in four thrust areas.  These thrust areas are:
 

Together, these research activities will develop a more complete understanding and definition of wind loads and wind effects on structures and better analysis and modeling tools for evaluating the resistance of the structures when they are subjected to hurricanes

Hurricane Wind Gust Structures:  Measurement, Characterization and Coastal Damage Mitigation
Sponsor:  Florida Sea Grant, 2000-2004

Principal Participants:  Kurt Gurley, Forrest Masters, Robin Weaver, Anne Cope, Luis Aponte, Desiree Cuenca, Krista Hayes

Project Description:  The project goals are to further the efforts of the Florida Coastal Monitoring Program (FCMP) by enhancing the instrumentation and analysis capabilities. The specific objective tasks are: 1) Develop and implement new instrumentation to: a) Measure the spatial correlation of hurricane wind field gusts; b) Provide real-time remote access to hurricane wind data while it is being collected. 2) Create analysis tool for the efficient processing and dissemination of collected hurricane wind data. The software developed for this Sea Grant project is available for download from the web site you are on now. Please follow the links from the homepage through ‘collected data’ to ‘download software’.

Modeling and Simulation of Wind Loads for Wind Hazard Mitigation
Sponsor:  National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award, 2000-2005

Principal Participants:  Kurt Gurley and Forrest Masters (Ph.D. candidate)

Project Description:  The research offers advancements in the accurate representation of natural hazard loads for application in structural reliability assessment. The focus is on the modeling and simulation of highly correlated non-Gaussian extreme wind loads on building components. Modeling efforts focus on the probability content, spatial and temporal coherence, integral effects over large areas, transient, and higher-order phenomena associated with extreme wind forces in the building envelope. Robust simulation methods will adopt these models, and provide a consistent frame­work for applications in reliability analysis. This will enhance the impact of reliability methods on hazard resistant design through a more realistic treatment of severe loading. Concurrent efforts in full-scale hurricane wind measurement near ground level will provide necessary data to advance this research. The educational goals are to produce engineers prepared to design against natural hazards, and to provide a medium for graduate work in this emerging field.

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