Hurricane Center Updating Storm Surge Maps for North Carolina’s Outer Banks

New storm surge maps for the Outer Banks of North Carolina will be available this summer.

The Virginian-Pilot of Norfolk reported that the National Hurricane Center will release the maps to predict where and how deep flooding would be in case of a tropical storm or hurricane.

The maps were tested on the Outer Banks two years ago.

Information from hundreds of hurricane forecasts was fed into a supercomputer to develop the maps.

Storms are usually measured by wind speed. The new maps will emphasize the dangers from flooding.

Jamie Rhome with the hurricane center says storm surge problems could be increasing as ocean levels rise and more people build near the coast.

Rhome says about half of water-related deaths during the storms are caused by storm surge.

Topics Catastrophe Natural Disasters Windstorm Hurricane North Carolina