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Ask HN: Biggest Achievements of Supercomputers

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Ask HN: Biggest Achievements of Supercomputers

#1

Post by slydo »

I always read about governments and companies getting even bigger and more powerful computers. But i don't know what the are used for. I heard they are used for weather predictions, even then i don't know what improvements have been made to that in the last 5, 10, 20 years.

What are the most notable achievements of supercomputers for companies, governments and humanity that you know of?

Re: Ask HN: Biggest Achievements of Supercomputers

#2

Post by Bostonian »

Here is an example of the benefit of better weather forecasting.

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/14/us/tornado-warnings.html

They Said the Tornado Would Hit at 9:30. It Hit at 9:30.

By Thomas Fuller and Tariro Mzezewa

New York Times

Dec. 14, 2021

…

Weather prediction technology has become so precise in recent years that tornadoes are almost always foreseen, a vast, if somewhat unheralded, improvement in forecasting.

In the late 1980s, before the use of Doppler radar and other technologies, meteorologists were able to issue warnings for 46 of 88 violent tornadoes in the United States, or just more than half, federal data shows. In recent years, powerful tornadoes have been preceded by warnings 97 percent of the time.

...

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