Hurricane Erin exploded from a tropical storm to a Category 4 hurricane in just 24 hours.
Winds surged from 70 to 145 mph, more than doubling overnight.
An exemplary case of rapid intensification.
That kind of transformation isn’t just meteorological. It’s a forecasting challenge.
When storms intensify this quickly, the margin for accurate prediction gets razor-thin.
This weekend, our team captured Erin’s evolution using
Tomorrow.io’s satellite sounders. Our sounders scanned Erin 22 times between August 14–18, including 3 during its rapid intensification.
That frequency provides a detailed, real-time view that could help improve forecasts of hurricane strength.
This is exactly the kind of problem we’re inviting you to solve.
Our first open challenge for Build Tomorrow asks:
How do we build better models to predict rapid intensification?
Hurricane Erin may not have yet threatened land, but it underscored how quickly conditions can change.
That makes improving rapid intensification forecasting one of the most urgent frontiers in weather science.
Have ideas?
Head to
build.tomorrow.io and help us push the science forward.
#BuildTomorrow #HurricaneErin