PREDICTING the weather sometimes seems more of an art than a science. The blindingly vast number of variables involved makes it almost impossible to compute accurately what is going to happen. Most of the time this is just inconvenient. But with hurricanes, better forecasting can save lives.
Last month tens of thousands of people fled from the path of hurricane Isabel – a maximum-strength category 5 storm, with winds of more than 250 kilometres per hour – as it swirled up from the Caribbean towards the east coast of America. The storm caused the deaths of around 30 people. Forecasters…
