RMS® HWind provides a comprehensive range of observation-based data products that deliver unique capabilities to help understand, anticipate, and manage tropical cyclone risk effectively.
HWind data products produce real-time and historical wind field analyses in the western North Atlantic, Eastern Pacific, and Central Pacific Basins, and real-time wind and storm surge forecasting products for the North Atlantic Basin.
Developed over more than 25 years by world-leading hurricane observation researchers, this high-quality, observation-based data is the industry standard for assessing damaging characteristics of tropical cyclones during and after landfall.
HWind products are used by (re)insurers, brokers, capital markets, academia, and government agencies for a variety of commercial and scientific purposes, such as real-time event preparation and response, post-event hazard and loss assessment, validation against past experience and research.
HWind consists of two primary products:
- HWind Real-Time Analysis
- Five-day forecast track scenarios, hazard and loss-producing analytics made available regularly once an Atlantic tropical cyclone is named
- Forecasting products use a proprietary methodology that combines real-time forecast track data from weather forecasting models, HWind data, and the RMS North Atlantic Hurricane Models modeling framework
- Instantaneous views of the tropical cyclone track and hazard characteristics produced every six hours throughout the storm’s life cycle
- Event analysis based on the latest observations from a variety of data sources, including aircraft reconnaissance, dropsondes, buoys, and satellites, as well as real-time model data from domestic and international weather forecasting models
- Wind field footprints produced on a rolling, cumulative basis every six hours over the lifetime of the storm, leveraging all preceding snapshot analyses
- HWind Enhanced Archive
- Catalog of 25+ years of high-resolution wind-impact images, snapshots, and footprints from historical tropical cyclones
- Informed by the same underlying science used for the HWind Real-Time Analysis products, as well as additional data not available during the event
- Additional analysis iterations match observational data and create the best representation of a storm’s track and hazard profile over time
