HURRICANE ALICIA STORM SURGE AND WAVE DATA 
PART I: INTRODUCTION 
Background 
1. The Hurricane Surge Prototype Data Collection Work Unit was initiated 
in 1980, the year the last hurricane (Allen) made landfall in the continental 
United States prior to hurricane Alicia in August 1983. Alicia provided the 
first opportunity to employ techniques and methodologies developed under the 
work unit during actual hurricane conditions. 
2. Alicia had atypical origins since it developed in the central Gulf 
of Mexico and made landfall less than 2 days after showing signs of deepen- 
ing into a significant storm. Alicia's rapid development required an espec- 
ially quick response by the hurricane surge data collection field team. The 
field team was in the vicinity of predicted landfall within 12 hr of the 
time Alicia was upgraded to a hurricane. The forecast position issued by the 
National Hurricane Center at that time indicated Alicia would make landfall 
before daylight on 18 August; consequently, the field team worked assuming 
they had only 1 day of daylight to deploy onshore gages. 
3. This report is the second in a series* providing a data base directed 
toward verification of numerical storm surge models. As such, the emphasis is 
on quantitative measurements of the hydrodynamic and meteorological parameters 
of Alicia rather than documentation of structural damage or changes in coastal 
morphology. The photographs referred to in Part V are intended to assist in- 
vestigators in assessing the applicability of individual highwater marks in 
verifying a given numerical model. 
Purpose and Scope 
4. This report contains coastal and inland hydrographs, highwater marks, 
significant wave height and wave spectra, and basic meteorological data associ- 
ated with hurricane Alicia. The data contained herein have been compiled from a 
variety of sources; consequently they cannot be guaranteed to be 100 percent 
accurate. Nevertheless, every reasonable effort was made and great care was 
taken to ensure that the data are the best and most complete available. 
* Thomas H. Flor. 1983 (Jul). “Poststorm Reconnaissance of Tropical Storm | 
Chris,''’ Miscellaneous Paper HL-83-5, Report 1, US Army Engineer Waterways 
Experiment Station, Vicksburg, Miss. 
