Wireless Sensor Network System Deployment During Hurricane Nicole, Satellite Beach, FL, November 2022

The Florida Tech Wireless Sensor Network System (FIT WSNS) and Florida Tech LiDAR measured and recorded pressure, temperature and wind data during the passage of Hurricane Nicole from 2022/11/08 to 2022/11/11. The FIT WSNS consists of pressure and temperature sensors, and a R.M. Young anemometer; deployed on a residential house roof in Satellite Beach, Florida (GPS LOC: 28°10'33.5"N 80°35'41.8"W).

The Florida Tech LiDAR, a conically scanning ZephIR Z300 LIDAR was placed in a secured yard approximately 50 m (~ 150 ft) across the street and configured to measure at 11 different range gates (11 m - 300 m AGL). Additional meteorological data (ambient air temperature, relative humidity, and barometric pressure) were collected from an independent Airmar meteorological station on top of the LiDAR at 1 m AGL.

An additional meteorological mast was deployed int the front yard of the residence with an independent R.M. Young anemometer (3.3 m AGL), a temperature and relative humidity sensor (2 m AGL), barometric pressure sensor, and tipping bucket rain gauge connected to a Hobo data logger. The instruments on the meteorological mast sampled at 1 Hz and were logged as a 1 minute average. A maximum 3 s gust and direction is also logged.

The different anemometry used in the WSNS and LiDAR deployments during Nicole are useful to study wind changes across the residence. FIT WSNS deployment consisted of 22 pressure sensors and 6 pressure taps with sampling rate (SR) = 10Hz, 1 reference pressure with SR = 10Hz and 2 anemometers with SR = 1Hz. The goal of the Nicole Deployment is to 1) Measure actual near-surface wind profiles for different wind speeds and directions; 2) Analyze wind pressures on the residential house roof and wind data from different anemometry, with Jupyter notebooks; 3) Use field data to validate and improve current wind loads recommendations and models for pressure distributions on building components, wind profiles and terrain roughness characterization.