The Florida Coastal Monitoring Program (FCMP): A review

The Florida Coastal Monitoring Program (FCMP) is a multi-university field research program that was founded in 1998 to study the near-surface wind and rain characteristics of Atlantic hurricanes and their effects on coastal infrastructure. The FCMP has three research thrusts: (1) characterization of surface wind and wind-driven rain conditions, (2) quantification of wind induced component and cladding pressures, and (3) assessment of damage to evaluate the performance of single family homes and the building codes and standards that guided their construction. This paper presents an overview of the program, including the motivation for the field research, a review of the program's scientific objectives, the history of the program from 1999–2010, and descriptions of the instrument systems and supporting infrastructure. A case study of Hurricane Frances (2004) is presented, and the current and potential uses of the collected wind field data are discussed.