Update Flood Maps

People did not really know what the actual effect of a 11-13 foot storm surge was in terms of feet of water in their home or office/store./etc. It seem this can be calculated and made known to the public, now especially with Sandy as a real world yardstick. I people had had this data (ie: at 8 pm your store or house will have 6 feet of water in it) people could have prepared better, moved valuables & merchandise upstairs or totally away, etc. I know of once case where employees moved computers to desktop level thinking that was certainly high enough - but were off by three feet.

We have Zones A B & C now. Were they accurate? Can we now predict exactly how much water will be at a particular address based on a certain level of predicted surge? Should zone be more granular - or some how indicate actual depths in feet based on surge levels predicted?

Is anyone capturing actual flood levels at various places? I saw that at 16 Fulton Street (South Street Seaport Museum) it was about 6' based on looking at the water mark on the windows. But by now the windows may have been washed and that data lost. We need to get data quickly before memories fade and physical evidence is lost.

It should be possible to develop an cell phone app that can tell you exactly what water level to expect at a certain time at any given location, combining NOAA and other predictions, location based on GPS (or by typing in an address if no GPS available), barometric pressure, tide level, wind and other factors. That level may be different in various addresses within a zone. Further this should be updated in real time as surges may be more or less than predicted.(Disclosure - Ed Bacon suggested that one).