Name
Investigating Dynamic Behavior of Compound Flood Hazard and Exposure During Tropical Cyclones.
Date & Time
Tuesday, May 5, 2026, 11:00 AM - 11:15 AM
Description

When flooding is driven by multiple flood-generating drivers, such as storm surge, winds, rainfall, and inland discharge, it is referred to as compound flooding (CF), which is more widespread, extending from the coast to far inland and devastating than flooding driven by a single driver. This study hindcasts and compares the flooding from Hurricane Harvey (2017) and Hurricane Ike (2008) across Galveston-Houston, Texas, to investigate how pluvial, fluvial, coastal, and compound processes contribute to the hazards and property-level exposures during these events. We employ a reduced-physics hydrodynamic model (Super-Gast Inundation of CoastS, SFINCS) to hindcast flooding extent and inundation depth, accounting for coastal, pluvial, and fluvial flooding processes. The study investigates approximately 1.6 million buildings across the region. The model skillfully reproduces observations from NOAA tide gauges, USGS stream gauges, and FEMA high-water mark stations. The investigation reveals that the extent of flooding is dynamic and varies from hurricane to hurricane. The contributions of different flooding processes (coastal, pluvial, fluvial, and compound) to the flood extent vary significantly across the hurricane periods. We found that the property-level exposures differ significantly between Hurricane Harvey and Hurricane Ike. Though compound flooding from Hurricane Harvey was widespread compared to that from Hurricane Ike, more buildings were inundated during Hurricane Ike. The study underscores the dynamic behavior of tropical cyclone (TC)-driven compound flood (CF) hazard and exposure across hurricanes and suggests investigating multiple TC-driven CFs to obtain robust CF hazard and exposure estimates.             

Location Name
202A
Is presenter a student?
No