Hurricane flood threat coming soon to Google

By Jim Loney

MIAMI (Reuters) - Americans in the hurricane danger zone may soon be able to use Google to find out if their own home is threatened by a dangerous storm surge, the director of the National Hurricane Center said on Wednesday.

Storm surge, the massive wall of water carried onto land by a hurricane, is considered perhaps its most destructive element and greatest threat to the lives of people who ignore evacuation orders in vulnerable coastal areas.

Bill Read, who was appointed head of the Miami-based U.S. forecasting center in January, said a planned program will couple a Google application with storm surge data that meteorologists have used for years to determine the flooding threat from any category of storm.

"People can plug in their address and see at what level they are at risk," Read told Reuters in an interview.

He said he hoped the program would be available during the coming Atlantic hurricane season, which runs from June 1 to November 30.

Data gathered during Hurricane Katrina, which killed 1,500 people and caused $80 billion damage on the U.S. Gulf Coast in 2005, found the storm surge reached up to 22 feet above normal sea level in eastern Mississippi.

Hurricane Andrew, the destructive Category 5 storm that hit the Miami area in 1992, pushed at least 16 feet of water ashore south of the city.

The damage a storm can cause is largely dependent on its storm surge, and whether it hits a city or a sparsely populated area. Despite the catastrophic damage of Katrina, New Orleans was spared the worst of the surge.