At the end of October 2012, Hurricane Sandy devastated parts of the Caribbean and the northeast of the North American continent. When the hurricane made landfall in the United States it blended with a continental cold front forming a storm described as the "Monsterstorm" by the media. The human and material loss caused by this hurricane was considerable.

Third-party users of the Environment Canada (EC) weather forecast system noted that it provided very useful guidance for the trajectory and intensity of the storm. Ensemble and deterministic approaches were combined to ensure a very accurate forecast; the ensemble approach improved the level of confidence of the forecast and the deterministic approach obtained more detailed forecasts. Louis Ucellini, the Director of National Centers for Environmental Predictions, mentioned that American forecasters favoured the Environment Canada and American forecasting systems to predict the unusual trajectory of the storm.

The improvements in forecasting tropical storms and their transition in our latitudes have been an important research and development activity of the Meteorological Research Division of EC in recent years. These improved forecasts performed by EC's global prediction systems are of critical value to public decision makers and often allow a rapid and effective response to avoid additional consequences following a storm of this magnitude.

Contact: Martin Charron, (514) 421-4664, martin.charron@ec.gc.ca, Atmospheric Numerical Weather Prediction Research