Cyclone Forecasting and Early Warning Systems

Systematic tropical cyclone forecasting in the United States traces its institutional roots to a hurricane warning network established by the U.S. Weather Bureau in the late nineteenth century, formalized in its modern form as the National Hurricane Center, based in Miami, Florida, in 1965. The launch of TIROS-1 by NASA on April 1, 1960, the first dedicated weather satellite, transformed tropical meteorology almost overnight by making it possible, for the first time, to detect a developing tropical cyclone over open ocean before it ever threatened a ship or coastline, closing a dangerous observational gap that had previously left forecasters dependent on scattered ship reports.