This project is aimed at a fundamental reexamination of the Monte Carlo approach, which is the current state-of-the-art, to estimate hurricane winds for the Gulf and Atlantic Ocean of the United States. The significance of wind engineering information produced in the measurements and analysis of recent hurricane events, improved data bases, and basic modeling approaches will be investigated. The feasibility of developing an improved hurricane prediction methodology will be examined and the limitations of the approach will be scrutinized by detailed research on each element of the model. Expected benefits from this study are more reliable estimates of the 50 and 100-year return period hurricanes windspeeds and directional characteristics.
