The Hurricane Decision Simulator: A Tool for Marine Forces in New Orleans to Practice Operations Management in Advance of a Hurricane

The U.S. Marine Forces Reserve (MFR) in New Orleans is frequently threatened by hurricanes. To protect the safety of personnel and their families while maintaining mission capability, the Commander must make timely decisions to set up an alternate headquarters and allow for an orderly evacuation. The MFR relies on forecasts from the National Hurricane Center, but these forecasts are uncertain, are updated frequently, and can be difficult to interpret in the context of the MFR’s decision timeline. In addition, there are few opportunities to learn from experience. We developed the Hurricane Decision Simulator (HDS) to allow MFR personnel to practice making preparation decisions in the context of many realistic simulated storms and forecasts, and to develop a better understanding of the decision sequence, the forecast products, and their relationship. The HDS has improved the MFR’s training and readiness for hurricane preparation operations and decision making by enabling more and better focused training and is being extended to other facilities.