Hurricane Ike 2008
Location: Galveston Island, Texas
Date: September 2008
CU-ATOC students and Center of Severe Weather teams (Fig. 1) intercepted hurricane Ike (Figs. 2 and 3), deploying to the landfall point in Galveston, Texas. A CSWR-Doppler on Wheels (DOW) was deployed in eastern Galveston, 10 wind measuring platforms were distributed on the eastern Galveston seawall, the Galveston causeway, and the Texas City seawall, two mobile mesonet vehicles, each deploying a disdrometer were deployed at either ends of the Galveston causeway (Fig. 4). The DOW collected many hours of data over the ultra-fine scale surface array. The center of the eye passed nearly exactly over the east Galveston surface array and the mobile vehilces (Fig. 5). DOW radar data from inside the eye reveal mesovortices rotating around the eye, likely enhancing winds and damage in the areas they cross (Fig. 6). The mesovortices likely crossed over the fine-scale surface arrays, so high resolution (50 m gating) and surface data will be compared. Crew who weathered the hurricane in Galveston were extracted safely and are on their way home.

Figure 1: CU-ATOC students and CSWR DOW team.
 Figure 2: Track of hurricane Ike making landfall at Galveston Island, Texas.
 Figure 3: NEXRAD radar reflectivity during landfall between 00 and 13 UTC on 13 September 2008. Small dots in the center indicate location of the instruments.


Figure 4: Instruments deplyed: DOW, 2 Mesonet Vehicles with optical disdrometers, and 10 mobile mesonet stations.
Figure 5: Particle-size distribution (color coded) and wind velocity (black line).


Figure 6: DOW Doppler velocity and radar reflectivity (color bar in Fig. 5) measured during the passage of the eye. Instrument location is indicated by colored dots (see Fig. 4), coastline is highlighted as white lines, and mesovortices rotating around the eye are indicated as black cycles (Courtesy: Josh Wurman, CSWR).