This is a past event.

Michael Dutter and Matt Zika
NOAA/National Weather Service
Marquette, MI

In an average year, U.S. residents face a spectrum of high-impact, environmental hazards which include severe thunderstorms, hurricanes, winter storms, floods, wildfires, poor air quality, and drought. These events have major economic and health safety impacts. NOAA’s National Weather Service is the sole U.S. government authority for issuing official weather and water warnings for life-threatening events, in partnership with the Weather Enterprise, and holds a key role in the nation’s disaster response plan.

NOAA’s National Weather Service is transforming its operations to help America become a “Weather-Ready Nation,” (WRN). A significant part of building community resilience in the face of increasing vulnerability to extreme weather and water events revolves around Science, Technology and Research activities. The NWS is working on several key scientific and research priorities that have been identified in support of the WRN and Integrated Decision Support Services (IDSS) across the nation. One of the critical Science and Technology goals of the NWS evolution of services is “Symbiotic Research to Operations and Operations to Research” in support of improved forecast and warning performance in the NWS. To achieve this goal, the NWS must reach out and build partnerships with the physical and social science research community and leverage those entities to develop and test new operationally relevant concepts and techniques.

This presentation will provide an overview of the National Weather Service focusing on operations at the NWS Office in Marquette and the unique challenges and limitations of forecasting the weather in the Upper Great Lakes. In addition, discussion on collaborative research to operations (R2O) programs between the NWS and the research community will occur, focusing on local and regional R2O activities.