Scientists enlist sharks to improve hurricane predictions
New Delhi: From Hollywood villains to ocean data collectors — sharks are now helping scientists forecast hurricanes.
Researchers at the University of Delaware are testing whether sharks can serve as mobile, near-real-time ocean-data observers. The idea: tag the predators with sensors that measure ocean conditions as they swim, feeding critical data into weather and climate models.
As a shark cuts through waters off the U.S. East Coast, it may be doing more than hunting. The sensors it carries track temperature, salinity, depth and other ocean parameters in areas that are hard for ships and buoys to reach — especially ahead of storms.
That information could help scientists better understand how warm ocean water fuels hurricane intensity before a storm makes landfall, improving forecasts and early warnings.
The project turns sharks into roaming monitors across vast stretches of ocean. By using animals that already cover huge distances, researchers hope to fill gaps in current ocean observation networks.
The study builds on earlier shark-tagging efforts, but focuses specifically on real-time data transmission to support oceanographic, atmospheric and climate models used in hurricane prediction.
