Hurricane season — from June through November in the Atlantic — is right around the corner. And while we won’t know the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) official predictions for another few weeks, that hasn’t stopped other long-range forecasters from staking their claims.
In Colorado State University’s 2023 forecast are six hurricanes and two major hurricanes (meaning Category 3 or greater). Researchers at North Carolina State University tend to agree with that: They predict six to eight hurricanes and two to three major hurricanes.
In the face of these storms, buildings on the East and Gulf Coasts are built to withstand life-threatening wind speeds ranging from 74 to more than 157 miles per hour. Or, at least, that’s the goal.
Last year, says the National Centers for Environmental Information, more than a dozen separate climate disasters exceeded $1 billion worth of damage in the U.S. — each. The total cost of these events? A whopping $171.5 billion in 2022 alone.
Determining the level of wind that a building should be designed to withstand can be tricky. But engineers may have just found a helpful sidekick in artificial intelligence.
