The most significant benefit of the use of the technique is that it has provided a more complete history of tropical cyclone intensity in areas where aircraft reconnaissance is neither possible nor routinely available . Intensity estimates of maximum sustained wind are currently within 5 miles per hour ( 8 @.@ 0 km / h ) of what aircraft are able to measure half of the time , though the assignment of intensity of systems with strengths between moderate tropical @-@ storm force ( 60 miles per hour ( 97 km / h ) ) and weak hurricane- or typhoon @-@ force ( 100 miles per hour ( 160 km / h ) ) is the least certain . Its overall precision has not always been true , as refinements in the technique led to intensity changes between 1972 and 1977 of up to 20 miles per hour ( 32 km / h ) . The method is internally consistent in that it constrains rapid increases or decreases in tropical cyclone intensity . Some tropical cyclones fluctuate in strength more than the 2 @.@ 5 T numbers per day limit allowed by the rule , which can work to the technique 's disadvantage and has led to occasional abandonment of the constraints since the 1980s . Systems with small eyes near the limb , or edge , of a satellite image can be biased too weakly using the technique , which can be resolved through use of polar @-@ orbiting satellite imagery . Subtropical cyclone intensity cannot be determined using Dvorak , which led to the development of the Hebert @-@ Poteat technique in 1975 . Cyclones undergoing extratropical transition , losing their thunderstorm activity , see their intensities underestimated using the Dvorak technique . This led to the development of the Miller and Lander extratropical transition technique which can be used under these circumstances .