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NOAA's NWS Focus
September 8, 2003 |
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Corporate Board
Considers Change and NWS Future Roles at Meeting
by
Joanne Swanson
Executive Secretary to the Corporate Board/Meteorologist
The National Weather
Service Corporate Board held its bi-annual meeting from August
26-28, 2003, at the Capital Hilton Hotel in Washington, DC. The
meeting gave the Board much to consider as the NWS approaches
a transition in leadership.
"This is an exciting time for the National Weather Service," said
Jack Kelly, who is also serving in the position of Deputy Under
Secretary for NOAA. "It is time for us to stop talking and start
doing; change is not comfortable but it is inevitable. NOAA's priorities
are changing and the National Weather Service should be ready to
do what is necessary to support those priorities."
The Board focused on learning more about the new NOAA management
processes of Program
Planning and Integration (PPI) also known as Matrix Management,
from NOAA's new Assistant Administrator for Program Planning and
Integration, Mary Glackin, and the Planning,
Programming, and Budgeting System from Bonnie Morehouse, Director
of Program Analysis and Evaluation within NOAA Finance and Administration.
More information on this management process and these offices can
be found at http://www.osp.noaa.gov/links.htm.
The Board also considered some important issues surrounding IFPS
deployment and the next steps in looking at ways to optimize our
services.
The Board also heard from two international counterparts in the
United Kingdom and Canada. Peter Ewins, Chief Executive of the
Meteorological Office in the United Kingdom (UKMET), which includes
the Hadley Centre for Climate, spoke of how the weather business
works in a quasi-public/private for-profit operation. Ewins addressed
the changes his organization went through since its change to a
for-profit status in 1996, and the mission implications of functioning
as a business without a total dependence on government funding.
For example, the UKMET has moved away from "stovepipes" defined
by function, such as observations, and moved to an organization
structure based on production, development, and research. He also
spoke at length about numerical weather prediction in Europe and
the value of competition. Check out Ewins'
presentation by clicking here.
The second international speaker was Pierre Dubreuil, Director-General
of the Canadian Meteorological Centre (CMC) in Montreal, part of
the Canadian Meteorological Service. The Canadian Meteorological
Service went through a large-scale change and centralization five
years ago, and were very nearly privatized. They now consist of
five storm centers, two of which produce all terminal aerodrome
forecasts for Canada.
"Though downsized, they are a visionary organization who have,
for example, used climate forecasts to indicate likely locations
of wetlands in the 10-to-50-year future time frame, in order to
plan the locations of wildlife reserves," said NWS Deputy Director
John Jones.
The Board also heard from eminent hydrologist Soroosh Sorooshian,
Professor at the Department of Hydrology and Water Resources of
the University of Arizona (in transit to a new position in California)
on the future of hydrological services. Sorooshian's remarks stressed
the importance of NWS/NOAA becoming bigger players in providing
hydrological and water resource information, and that the Advanced
Hydrologic Prediction Service is a good investment and will place
NWS "on the map" with the water resource industry. [Warning! The following presentation is almost 42 MB in size! If you
wist to view it, right click on the link, choose "Save File to Disk," and view
it from your hard drive. Here is the link to the file in Microsoft PowerPoint format.)]
Vernon
Morris, Associate Professor of Chemistry and Co-Director
of the Graduate Program in Atmospheric Sciences, Howard University,
spoke on the topic of "The Future
Workforce," highlighting the successes to date of the
NOAA Center for Atmospheric Sciences (NCAS) and related
programs aiming to increase the pool of diverse students
pursuing education in the atmospheric sciences.
At the close of the meeting the board shared farewell wishes
for outgoing Assistant Administrator Jack Kelly, who has agreed
to serve NOAA as the Deputy Under Secretary on a permanent basis,
where he will continue to provide leadership and expertise. Director
Kelly acknowledged the positive changes in the Board he has seen
since its inception under his direction, and the positive future
that awaits the NWS if we are ready to see a larger picture of
NOAA and play a bigger part in its priorities. "Implementing a
global observation system, climate prediction, services, and research
along with ocean prediction, services, exploration and research
are the main priorities at NOAA now, and we can be a big part of
making NOAA and NWS a success in all three."
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Working
Together to Save Lives:
Timely Flood Warning Alerts Pilot, Saves Lives
A timely flash flood warning
which preceded a rare heavy rainfall event in Las Vegas, NV, August
19, 2003, helped alert a local search and rescue pilot who subsequently
saved several people trapped in flooded cars.
According to Meteorologist-In-Charge Kim Runk, a Las Vegas Search
and Rescue pilot reported receiving and acting on the NWS flash
flood warning.
"Got into my helicopter and within 10-15 minutes, I was pulling
stranded motorists off the roofs of their vehicles," the pilot
wrote. "In one case, a car was swept away by the rapidly rising
waters only seconds after pulling the driver to safety. It was
a clear case of minutes saving lives!"
The local area was inundated by flash flooding, and one of Clark
County Flood Control District's rain gauges recorded 2.8 inches
of rain in an hour and three quarters: a deluge in the Nevada desert
terrain. Several gauge measurements qualified as 1-in-200 year
events. But it was the 2.4 inches in 45 minutes at Kyle Canyon
Detention Basin that was estimated to be approximately twice as
rare.
Statistics available in the newly-updated high resolution atlas
of precipitation frequency estimates [link here to Precipitation
Frequency story] (see related story) indicate portions of the Las
Vegas area experienced rainfall amounts that are not likely to
occur any more than once every 200 to 400 years.
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New Precipitation
Frequency Estimates Published Electronically
Updated precipitation
frequency estimates for Southeast California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona,
and New Mexico were recently published by experts in the Hydrometeorological
Design Studies Center (HDSC) of the Office of Hydrologic Development.
The updates have been published for the first time via the Internet
using the new Precipitation Frequency Data Server located at www.nws.noaa.gov/oh/hdsc/.
Civil Engineers and environmental planners use
precipitation frequency estimates to optimize the
design of a broad range of civil infrastructure from
roads, culverts, bridges and storm water drains to
environmentally sustainable streams and wetlands,
or almost anything affected by rain. The estimates
are also a key ingredient in the Federal Emergency
Management Agency's flood plain mapping program and
EPA's pollution discharge regulations.
"The Precipitation Frequency Data Server makes
getting the new estimates very easy for our users," says
Geoff Bonnin, HDSC Director. "It's much faster and
more convenient than looking for rare hard-copy documents,
and the web gives us opportunities to present more
data in forms that weren't available with the old
hard-copy documents."
The updates replace NOAA Atlas 2, published
in 1973, and Weather Bureau Technical Paper 49,
published in 1964. Previous publications made estimates
out to 100-year return periods but the new estimates
go out as far as 1,000 years as a result of longer
periods of record and better statistical techniques.
With the updated estimates, HDSC has begun including
ranges of probabilities or confidence intervals.
In the past, civil engineering designs have assumed
that precipitation frequency estimates were precise.
Confidence intervals are statistical measures that
account for the fact that the estimates are not precise
and may have a range of likely values. Bonnin said
he expects the addition of confidence intervals may
change the way local governments write their infrastructure
design regulations.
The new updates show there can be a considerable
amount of uncertainty in some areas, with fairly
wide ranges in the estimates. In the case of the
recent heavy rain event in Las Vegas, NV (see related
story) the local area was inundated by flash flooding,
and one of Clark County Flood Control District's
rain gauges recorded 2.4 inches of rain in 90 minutes:
a deluge in this desert terrain. Using statistics
available in the Precipitation Frequency Data Server,
HDSC experts have determined that the 500-year 90-minute
event at that location in Las Vegas may be as high
as 3.8 inches or as low as 2.3 inches (at the 90
percent confidence level).
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Training: National
AWIPS Case Study Library Released
A new online library should
give NWS forecast offices access to a wide range of operationally-focused
training materials.
In August, the NWS Office of Climate, Water, and Weather Service's
(OCWWS's) Training Division released the National Advanced Weather
Interactive Processing System (AWIPS) Case
Study Library (CSL) as part of the Science and Operations Officer/Science
and Training Resource Center (SOO/STRC). The CSL is the online
repository for operational data and support documentation used
in training.
"The goal of the Case Study Library is to organize the best of
the WFO-developed, AWIPS-based training efforts into a single location
and make these valuable resources available to each office," said
Robert Rozumalski, National SOO/Science and Training Resource Coordinator.
The Case Study Library provides a means of exchanging training
materials used with the Weather Event Simulator (WES), Display
2-Dimensions (D2D), and Display 3-Dimensions (D3D). Office trainers
may select from a collection of peer-reviewed case modules identified
by educational objectives and organized for easy identification
so offices can best meet their particular training needs.
The CSL will provide resources for training in a variety of areas,
including:
- Warning decision-making
- Forecasting techniques
- Forecasting tool operations
- Data type operations
- Scientific principle applications
- Specific weather phenomena experience
- Case study research project data
Training includes case modules on AWIPS-formatted data on DVD
and a companion study guide to help trainers provide meaningful
instruction regardless of whether they have prior expertise in
a particular subject area.
"We are encouraging forecast offices to submit locally-developed
training materials to the National Case Study Library," said Eli
Jacks, Acting Chief, OCWWS Training Division. The Training Division
is using NWS SOO expertise in a peer-review process to ensure the
modules maintain a high level of quality in terms of scientific
content and applicability to operational forecasting. Jacks said
authors of case modules are identified in the CSL.
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Utilities, Emergency
Managers Get Digital Forecast Database Introduction From NWS
Emergency managers and
two regional utility companies learned how they could use the National
Digital Forecast Database (NDFD) during demonstrations given by staff
at the Reno, NV, Weather Forecast Office (WFO) recently.
Roger Lamoni, WFO Reno WCM, and other office staff, hosted a
web information review and NDFD introduction for local emergency
management and operations staff of SBC Nevada and the Sierra Pacific
Power Company during August 2003.
Sierra Pacific Power was interested in using the NDFD since it
calculates gas requirements, and daily and real time electricity
loads, using an hourly and daily "Effective Degree Day" (EDD),
according to Gas Plant Supervisor Mike Rodriguez. EDD is calculated
using forecast temperature, cloud cover, and wind.
"By importing NDFD data to calculate these parameters, Sierra
Pacific hopes to increase the accuracy of temperature and weather
forecasts, and thereby more accurately estimate gas requirements,
which ensures reliability and eliminates unnecessary gas purchases," Rodriguez
said. "Accurate short-term consumption forecasts also improve the
reliability of the power supply, eliminating unnecessary spot power
purchases and more accurately predicting additional power purchases
as weather and temperature changes increases electricity demand."
Currently, Sierra Pacific calculates an EDD only for the Reno-Tahoe
International Airport and applies this value system-wide. Using
NDFD data, Sierra Pacific may be able to generate hourly EDD graphics
and data across their entire service area. Lamoni said Sierra Pacific
was excited about the new capabilities, and is optimistic about
new services that private vendors could develop using the NDFD.
WFO Reno plans to host a hands-on meeting with Geographical Information
Systems (GIS) employees of these companies to give them an opportunity
to ask questions and explore ways they can access and manipulate
the NDFD data to suit their companies' needs. In conjunction with
local emergency managers, WFO Reno also plans to hold a meeting
in December 2003 to introduce NDFD capabilities to government and
media representatives.
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Take
a look at other NWS news, as submitted for the NOAA
Weekly Report
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Click
here to take a look at NOAA-wide employee news, as posted
in the latest issue of AccessNOAA
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questions and comments to NWS.Communications.Office@noaa.gov or
mail to:
National Weather
Service
Communications Office
ATTN: W/COM
1325 East West Highway
Silver Spring, MD 20910-3283
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