What Is Six Hours Worth? The Impact of Lead Time on Tropical-Storm Preparation Decisions
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Authors
Regnier, Eva D.
Subjects
natural disasters
probability
forecasts
sequential decision analysis
probability
forecasts
sequential decision analysis
Advisors
Date of Issue
2020
Date
2020
Publisher
Informs
Language
en_US
Abstract
Emergency managers must make high-stakes decisions regarding preparation for tropical storms when there is still considerable uncertainty regarding the storm’s impacts. Forecast quality improves as lead time until the forecast events declines. Reducing the lead time required for preparation decisions can substantially improve the quality of forecasts available for decision making and thereby, reduce the expected total costs of preparations plus storm damage. Measures of forecast quality are only indirectly linked to their value in preparation decisions and changes in the parameters of those decisions—in particular lead time. This paper provides decision-relevant measures of the quality of recent National Hurricane Center forecasts from the 2014–2018 seasons, which can be used to evaluate reductions in decision lead time in terms of false alarm rate, missed detections, and expected annual costs. For decision makers in some regions with decision lead times of 48–72 hours—typical for evacuation decisions—every 6-hour reduction in required lead time can reduce the false alarm rate by more than 10%.
Type
Article
Description
The article of record as published may be found at https://doi.org/10.1287/deca.2019.0396
Series/Report No
Department
Graduate School of Defense Management (GSDM)
Organization
Naval Postgraduate School
Identifiers
NPS Report Number
Sponsors
This work was supported by the Marine Forces Reserve via Naval Research Program [Grant NPS-18-M294A].
Funder
This work was supported by the Marine Forces Reserve via Naval Research Program [Grant NPS-18-M294A].
Format
15 p.
Citation
Eva D. Regnier (2020) What Is Six Hours Worth? The Impact of Lead Time on Tropical-Storm Preparation Decisions. Decision Analysis 17(1):9-23
Distribution Statement
Rights
This publication is a work of the U.S. Government as defined in Title 17, United States Code, Section 101. Copyright protection is not available for this work in the United States.