The National Hurricane Research Project (NHRP) was initiated in 1955 by the
United States Weather Bureau in response to the devastating 1954 hurricane season, which
saw Hurricane Carol

Hurricane Carol

Hurricane Carol was among the worst tropical cyclones to affect the New England region of the United States. It developed from a tropical wave near the Bahamas on August 25, 1954, and gradually strengthened as it moved northwestward. On August 27, Carol intensified to reach winds of , but weakened...

, Hurricane Edna

Hurricane Edna

Hurricane Edna was a deadly and destructive major hurricane that impacted the United States East Coast in September of the 1954 Atlantic hurricane season. It was one of two hurricanes to strike Massachusetts in that year, the other being Hurricane Carol...

, and Hurricane Hazel

Hurricane Hazel

Hurricane Hazel was the deadliest and costliest hurricane of the 1954 Atlantic hurricane season. The storm killed as many as 1,000 people in Haiti before striking the United States near the border between North and South Carolina, as a Category 4 hurricane...

 bring destruction and
flooding to New England and the Mid-Atlantic states.
Robert Simpson

Bob Simpson (meteorologist)

Dr. Robert Homer Simpson is a meteorologist, hurricane specialist, first director of the National Hurricane Research Project , and a former director of the National Hurricane Center...

, a Weather Bureau meteorologist who had
participated in Air Force hurricane reconnaissance flights as an observer, was appointed as
the first director of NHRP and organized the Research Operations Base at Morrison Air Force
Base (now Palm Beach International Airport

Palm Beach International Airport

Palm Beach International Airport is a public airport located 3 nautical miles west of Palm Beach, Florida, in West Palm Beach, Florida, and serves Palm Beach County. The airport is operated and maintained by Palm Beach County Department of Airports. Road access to the airport is available...

) in West Palm Beach, FL in 1956.

During the first three years of the Project, scientists used three specially
instrumented Air Force Hurricane Hunters

Hurricane Hunters

The Hurricane Hunters are aircraft that fly into tropical cyclones in the North Atlantic Ocean and Northeastern Pacific Ocean for the specific purpose of directly measuring weather data in and around those storms. In the United States, the Air Force, Navy, and NOAA units have all participated in...

 aircraft with crews on bailment from the 55th
Weather Reconnaissance Squadron. They flew missions into Hurricane Greta

Hurricane Greta

The name Greta has been used for three tropical cyclones in the Atlantic Ocean. The name was used in several different schemes, as well as in the four and ten-year lists....

 (1956),
Hurricane Audrey

Hurricane Audrey

Hurricane Audrey was the first major hurricane of the 1957 Atlantic hurricane season. Audrey was the only storm to reach Category 4 status in June. A powerful hurricane, Audrey caused catastrophic damage across eastern Texas and western Louisiana. It then affected the South Central United States as...

 (1957),
Hurricane Daisy (1958),
and Hurricane Helene (1958)

Hurricane Helene (1958)

Hurricane Helene was the strongest hurricane in the 1958 Atlantic hurricane season, reaching peak winds of and tied with Hurricane Ilsa as the strongest tropical cyclone of the season. The system moved to the north of the West Indies and skirted the coast of the Southeast United States before...

 in this initial period, collecting data which delineated the
structure and energy budget of hurricanes for the first time.

In 1959, the Project was moved to Miami and collocated with the Miami hurricane forecast
office. Simpson left the Project to complete his doctoral degree and Robert Cecil Gentry
was appointed NHRP director. The Department of Commerce leased two DC-6 aircraft and
received a B-57 jet from the Air Force so that NHRP could continue to carry out airborne
experiments on hurricanes. The combination of research project, forecast center, and
aircraft facility was dubbed the "National Hurricane Center

National Hurricane Center

The National Hurricane Center , located at Florida International University in Miami, Florida, is the division of the National Weather Service responsible for tracking and predicting weather systems within the tropics between the Prime Meridian and the 140th meridian west poleward to the 30th...

" (NHC). This has caused
later confusion, since 1967 the NHC name has been used exclusively by the forecast center.
However the Project and Research Flight Facility (RFF) remained separate entities, with
their own personnel, budgets, and objectives.

During the 1960s, while NHRP continued to carry out research flights into
Hurricane Donna

Hurricane Donna

Hurricane Donna in the 1960 Atlantic hurricane season was a Cape Verde-type hurricane which moved across the Leeward Islands, Puerto Rico, Hispanola, Cuba, The Bahamas, and every state on the East Coast of the United States...

 (1960), Hurricane Cleo

Hurricane Cleo

Hurricane Cleo was the third named storm, first hurricane, and first major hurricane of the 1964 Atlantic hurricane season. Cleo was one of the longest-lived storms of the season...

 (1964), and Hurricane Betsy

Hurricane Betsy

Hurricane Betsy was a Category 4 hurricane of the 1965 Atlantic hurricane season which caused enormous damage in the Bahamas, Florida, and Louisiana. Betsy made its most intense landfall near the mouth of the Mississippi River, causing significant flooding of the waters of Lake Pontchartrain into...

 (1965), the
Project also began to create computer models of hurricane circulation, formulated a
statistical track program (NHC-64), wrote a manual on hurricane forecasting, and evaluate
the accuracy of track forecasts. Starting with Hurricane Esther (1961)

Hurricane Esther (1961)

Hurricane Esther was the fifth named storm and fifth hurricane of the 1961 Atlantic hurricane season. A long-lived Category 4 Cape Verde-type hurricane, Esther spent its lifetime offshore, before moving up the East Coast of the United States...

, NHRP was
heavily involved with Project STORMFURY

Project Stormfury

Project Stormfury was an attempt to weaken tropical cyclones by flying aircraft into them and seeding with silver iodide. The project was run by the United States Government from 1962 to 1983....

, the U. S. Government's experiment in hurricane
modification. They seeded Hurricane Beulah in 1963, but had to wait six more years before a
suitable candidate storm entered their operational area.

Late in 1964, the Project was renamed the National Hurricane Research Laboratory

National Hurricane Research Laboratory

The National Hurricane Research Laboratory was formed in December 1964 out of the National Hurricane Research Project, the U. S. Weather Bureau's effort to scientifically examine tropical cyclones in order to make better predictions. Laboratory status signified that this effort was now a...

in
recognition of it becoming a permanent institution within the Weather Bureau. This presaged
the creation of the Environmental Research Laboratories the next year.