A study has found that the U.S. death toll from a major hurricane could be far worse than previously predicted, the head of the National Hurricane Center said Tuesday to mark the opening of the 1988 Atlantic storm season. Recently completed hurricane coastal flood models for the Atlantic and Gulf coasts show that many more people than earlier thought must be evacuated under certain conditions, said center director Bob Sheets. Forty-three million people live in about 175 coastal counties from Maine to Texas, and evacuating crowded urban areas and barrier islands is virtually impossible, Sheets said. There are not enough shelters to handle the added load and there are serious concerns how new glass-windowed high-rises would fare if lashed by hurricane-force winds during evacuations, he said. During a hurricane that struck Houston, ``glass was flying everywhere,'' said Sheets. He refused to make predictions about the 1988 hurricane season, saying no one has convinced forecasters they can reliably predict the number and severity of storms. The first tropical depression of the year has formed, and remained stationary Tuesday night just south of the western tip of Cuba, or about 200 miles southwest of Havana. The system contained winds of up to 30 mph and was not expected to strengthen. One of the two satellites used to keep track of hurricanes could fail this year, forecasters said. ``It's quite possible this year that we could lose GOES-West at anytime,'' hurricane specialist Bob Case said of the Geo-Stationary Earth-Orbiting Environmental Satellite, which records atmospheric conditions over the Pacific Ocean and part of the Western Hemisphere. If that satellite does stop working, GOES-East would have to be directed to move from its equatorial orbit over Brazil to a spot south of the Texas Gulf Coast, where it would provide a view of the Western Hemisphere with limited vision in the hurricane-spawning eastern Atlantic, he said. A previous GOES-East expired in 1984 and temporarily deprived meteorologists of Atlantic atmospheric photographs. A typical Atlantic hurricane season, from June 1 to Nov. 30, has 10 named tropical storms with rain and maximum sustained wind exceeding 39 mph, six of which become hurricanes with drenching rain and wind over 74 mph, Case said. In 1987 there were only three hurricanes and four tropical storms in the Atlantic. Hurricane Emily slammed into the Dominican Republic on Sept. 22, causing three deaths with wind gusts up to 110 mph. It recovered enough punch to belt Bermuda with 116 mph wind three days later. ``Emily was the fastest moving hurricane of any known in this century,'' Case said. Hurricane Arlene meandered through the Atlantic in mid-August with top wind of 75 mph. Hurricane Floyd hit Key West with 75 mph wind but fizzled out over the Everglades and Miami in mid-October. Here are the names to be given to Atlantic tropical storms that could grow into hurricanes this season: Alberto, Beryl, Chris, Debby, Ernesto, Florence, Gilbert, Helene, Isaac, Joan, Keith, Leslie, Michael, Nadine, Oscar, Patty, Rafael, Sandy, Tony, Valerie and William.
The National Hurricane Center study said that the US death toll from a major hurricane could be far worse than previously predicted as they marked the opening of 1987. The first tropical depression of the year has formed just south of Cuba but is not expected to strengthen. A hurricane specialist said that the Geo-Stationary Earth-Orbiting Environmental Satellite that covers part of the Western Hemisphere may stop working making it necessary to redirect GOES-East in order to monitor the hurricane-spawning area. In the 1988 storm season, there were only three hurricanes, Emily, Arlene, and Floyd, and four tropical storms in the Atlantic.