Windstorm striking Porthleven, Cornwall, January 4, 1998 / Simon Burt
Climate extremes Weather and climate extremes - notably tropical storms, extra-tropical storms and precipitation extremes - cause disaster and loss worldwide each year. We examine the drivers of variability in these events, and we model and predict their occurrence. This work is underpinned by historical and real-time satellite data, climate reanalysis data, weather station data and our own modeling. We also study the influence of solar activity on cold winters. Our work includes a strong applied theme with product development and licensing to the insurance industry and links to humanitarian organisations. We have created innovative extreme weather services for global tropical storms and European extreme weather, and we are developing a 100-year UK wind gust database to underpin new UK windstorm products. MSSL has been at the forefront of space science since the beginning of the space age, and will celebrate 50 years at the Holmbury St Mary site in 2017. We are involved in many of the key missions for the future including JWST (James Webb Space Telescope), Euclid, Solar Orbiter, ExoMars, JUICE and SMILE (Solar Wind Magnetosphere Ionosphere Link Explorer). We lead and collaborate on proposals for future missions and instrumentation. Our engineering is second to none; for example, our Cluster PEACE (Plasma Electron And Current Experiment) instrument continues to work well on all four spacecraft of the ESA Cluster mission after more than 15 years in orbit. Our research also has strong impacts in other fields, such as space weather effects, crack detection in steel manufacture and hurricane forecasting and relief. We are at the leading edge of scientific research and technology and our goal is to understand our place in the Universe.
How do we improve our understanding of the drivers and predictability of the UK/European winter
climate and Atlantic hurricane activity? How do we use 100
years of data to develop innovative UK windstorm products for the insurance industry?
Hurricane Katrina, 2005 / NASA
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