Portcast continuously monitors active weather disruptions around the world and automatically flags which ports, vessels, and shipments are at risk — so you can get a clear view on the magnitude of impact of weather disruptions in your supply chain. This article explains how that process works, from detecting a weather disruption to surfacing a risk alert on your shipment.
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Weather disruptions risks under the Portcast platform focus on cyclone, typhoon and hurricane events. More types of weather disruptions might be included in the future.
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Portcast ingests live cyclone data from meteorological tracking sources at 6-hour intervals. For each storm, we capture its current position, wind speed (in knots), and a forecasted path showing where the cyclone is predicted to travel over the coming days.
A cyclone is treated as active when its most recent data point is within the last 24 hours and its wind speed exceeds 40 knots. Active cyclones are continuously re-evaluated as new forecast data arrives.
Each cyclone is identified by a unique code (e.g. ERIN (AL052025)), so forecast updates are always tied to the right storm — even when two storms share a similar name.
Portcast classifies cyclone intensity as Low, Medium or High, based on wind speed thresholds. Wind speeds also affect a cyclone's sphere of influence — the area around the storm considered operationally at risk.
For every point along a cyclone's current and forecasted path, Portcast draws a sphere of influence and checks which active container ports fall within it.
Only active container ports are considered. This filters out minor or dormant facilities that would create noise without meaningful operational impact.
If a port falls within the sphere of influence during a given window, it is flagged as at risk for that timeframe, with a specific impact start date and end date.
Example: If a cyclone is forecast to pass near the Port of San Juan between 22–25 August, the port is flagged at risk from 22 August to 25 August. Any vessel scheduled to call there during that window — and any shipment on board — will be evaluated for risk.
Once at-risk ports are identified, Portcast checks vessels in two ways: