No more NWS

[chucko]

I saw on the news (can't find on the net yet) that a PA (home of accuweather) congressman is trying to kill the NWS.....Well kill is not the word . There would still be one that only gives info to the news and accuweather type....and there may also be no more NWS radio. no more NWS web site and so on.

(if I over steped what we are allowed to talk about feel free to delete this but I feel it is related)

 

[dmccarty]

Chucko,

A mail list server I'm a member of just had a discussion on the bill in question. To make a long story short, the Congress critter that proposed the bill has no backing from other congress critters and the chance of passing the bill out of the Senate, I think he was in the Senate, to go to the House was slim to none.

I THINK this has happened before. I seem to remember this popping up a few years ago and it went no where. I hope the people of PA vote this %^&*( out of office. Anyone proposing this sort of nonsense needs to be doing something constructive like digging ditches for the rest of their life. Course making gravel from big rocks with a hammer while in the slammer may be a better solution.

Later,
Dan

 

[Gomez]

I did a quick search and found out the senator is Rick Santorum. I've pasted what someone else has summarized below.

1) NWS will be the sole and official source of flash flood and severe
weather warnings.

2) NWS will provide, as decided upon by the Secretary of Commerce, data,
information or analysis essential to protect life and property.

3) NWS will not provide any data, product or service that is currently
being provided or could be provided by the private sector. The only
exceptions are: information and warnings critical to protect life and
property, information and data the US is obligated to provide under
international agreements, and any other service the Secretary feels the
private sector is unable to provide.

4) Any critical data, guidance, forecasts, etc must be provided in real-
time and all external groups must have equal access.

5) No governmental official will provide outside entities with data
ahead of official release of information or provide additional comments
after the official release of information.
*******************************


It doesn't sound like the end for NWS, but I'd rather keep things the way they are. I'll let Rick know my feelings. /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif

 

[bczoom]

I went to Senator Santorum's senate.gov site and found this.

At a quick glance, I'm not sure how to read the outcome but it sounds like this legislation is in response to a NOAA (parent of NWS) decision to repeal a non-competion policy with private sector weather entities.

 

[mikim]

Don't y'all know I'm glad I'm currently retirement eligible and plan on getting out in 19 months. Whatever D.C. might decide to do won't be able to be enacted til after I'm gone. I just hope they leave my retirement alone. PERSONAL NOTE: although I'm an employee of NWS .... I still have personal opinions .... that are NOT in any way an official position of / by / or from NWS ......
Accuweather has been pushing this type of stuff for a long time. The driving force? $$$$$ .. They'd be able to make a whole lot more of it if we were out of the daily forecast business. We provide for free (free = paid for by the public's taxes) what accuweather wants to charge for. We provide it to the public many ways, including via web sites AND via TV stations that use our stuff. We provide it to entities that repackage it then sell it .... actually some of that repackaging is pretty darn good -- they take our raw data - run it through their computers - and turn out a pretty fine product. Anyone who might see something called "Viper" radar on TV is seeing NWS radar data from one of those. Accuweather would stop all that if they could. NOAA weather radio -- will not be going away - it may well be reprogrammed as "NOAA all hazard radio" and include security threats etc ... we already put "amber alerts" on it so it's name as NOAA weather radio is a bit of misnomer. That radio originates from NWS offices... it's all automated now and the voice is computer generated... but guess who maintains those computers and the comms connections to the radio transmitter sites? And who types up the info that goes into the computer in the first place? ........ We've had changes at the head of NOAA and NWS in very recent years and the handwriting on the wall that I see is NOAA would rather spend the money in maritime research than on the NWS. From my seat - it looks pretty grim for the NWS 10 years from now -----If you're at all concerned PLEASE write your reps in D.C. .... They don't know any better unless they hear from the public.........soapbox off.....

 

[OkeeDon]

Do Accuweather or any of the other commercial weather services (if there are any) use any part of the NWS data for the commercial service? Or, do they redundantly collect the same information?

I guess I can't see how they can say it is "to better serve public" (from Mr. Santorum's site) if what it accomplishes is to give a monopoly to the commercial services to provide, and presumably charge for, the same information that taxpayers are already paying for.

It's interesting that they hasten to say that "...the legislation leaves NWS with complete and unfettered freedom to carry out its critical role of preparing and issuing severe weather warnings and forecasts designed for the protection of life and property of the general public. " What, Accuweather and their ilk want to make a profit from the weather, but don't want to use their information to protect the public?

I guess I don't understand.

 

[chucko]

"guess I don't understand."

my read on the whole thing is
NWS give dayly forcast for free - Accuweather wants $$$ for it and people will not by what they can get for free and I think this senitor has his hands in there pocket so if they get more $$$ it means more for him

 

[mikim]

I can't tell you what info accuweather may or may not get from us ... the info we provide is public domain...
To protect lives & property is part of our mission statement - severe weather warnings will remain our priority and the private sector wants no part of that ... liability issues ya know.

 

[mikim]

just went to the senators site ...... <font color="blue"> “This decision by NOAA to repeal the non-competition and non-duplication policy detracts from NWS’s core missions of maintaining a modern and effective meteorological infrastructure, collecting comprehensive observational data, and issuing warnings and forecasts of severe weather that imperil life and property,” said Senator Santorum.
</font> .......huh? how does providing the public the data we generate and gather for our job (and they paid for) detract from anything? All we do is put it out there - we have it - we develop it - we gather it - whatever - It actually helps us improve by putting info out to the public because we get feedback on the quality, quantity etc and requests & ideas for info in formats that we may not have thought of. If we have to work in a bubble without that feedback - it will be very hard to evaluate the job we are doing and thus improve.

 

[Amontilado]

As a current NWS employee and ex-AccuH*** employee, I hope that Joel Myers(founder, President, driving force behind) does not get his way. I don't know how much data he gets from sources outside of the NWS, but I can safely say that he gets the majority (75%+) from the NWS, either in the form of forecast model data, observational data, or basic forecasts. They then reformat that data(usually by computer with some human quality control) from which they generate the products for their customers. And I see that with the case of some experimental data that we make available at no cost, AccuWeather is the 2nd largest downloader of this data (at no cost to boot for them other than a computer and an internet connection). I can see the point of the private sector wanting to make a buck(don't we all), but our customers (you, the public) have paid for the data/forecasts already, why should they pay again, if the "value added" product is mroe than what they need.
What the private sector would ultimately like to see (IMHO) is an NWS issuing watches/warnings(too much liability for them), collect data(we have the infrastructure to handle do it at minimal cost to them), run the computer models (how many companies can handle the costs of running multpile supercomputers), give a forecast to the public(so they don't have to be bothered to give away a forecast), and give the data to the private sector at a minimal cost. I also believe that there is a bit of revenge in there(for all those meteorologists who have jumped ship to the NWS, for much better pay and opportunities), but this is just my opinion.

Stephen Miller
Mobile AL