Hurricane Dorian spaghetti models: How the storm-tracking tool works

The pasta-bilities are endless.

Experts are using their noodles to figure out where Hurricane Dorian will make landfall — by studying spaghetti models.

The long-range forecast models are known colloquially as spaghetti plots because of the multiple strings that are generated by some of the fastest computers on Earth, according to CNN.

The more the lines are clustered together, the higher the likelihood the storm will hit its expected target.

There are three kinds of spaghetti models — dynamical, statistical and ensemble.

Dynamical models require hours of numbers-crunching by a supercomputer to solve physical equations of motion.

Statistical models are based on historical relationships between a hurricane’s behavior and storm-specific details such as location and date.

Ensemble, or consensus, models are created by combining the forecasts from a variety of other models.

The models are run and operated by governments and private companies around the world.

For example, the Navy Global Environmental Model is run by the US Navy’s Fleet Numerical Meteorology and Oceanography Center.

Among the more familiar models are the American (GFS) and European (ECMWF) models, which are run by the US government and a partnership of European countries, respectively.

The forecast track from each model is represented by a line — with all of them checked constantly for changes, trends and consistency.

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