Northern Indiana NWS Skywarn Information
Welcome to the Northern Indiana National Weather Service (NWS) Skywarn program. Skywarn is a group of trained severe weather spotters that report directly to the NWS.
Year after year, reports from Skywarn volunteers assist the NWS in issuing more timely and accurate warnings based on real-time reports throughout our 37 County Warning Area covering northern Indiana, southern Michigan and northwest Ohio. The NWS's primary mission is to issue warnings to protect life and property.
The ground truth reports from Skywarn spotters are an integral part of the mission critical warning process that combines advanced Doppler radar data and meteorological skills. Their observations also provide us with information in compiling documentation of severe weather events, verification of warnings and service assessments. These reports become part of the Storm Data publication which provides data on a variety of severe and unusual weather phenomenon, including statistics on deaths, injuries, and property and crop damage nation-wide.
A large number of our Skywarn spotters are also licensed amateur radio operators, also known as "hams". The hams throughout many of our counties organize their spotter efforts on amateur radio frequencies when severe weather threatens. Many reports are relayed through the IMO (Indiana-Michigan-Ohio) Skywarn Network. Spotters in this network will then relay their reports directly to the amateur radio station WX9IWX at our office, which is manned by local amateur radio operators who volunteer their time to come into the office versus being in the field or at home. We want to thank all of the volunteer severe weather spotters for their time and commitment to Skywarn.
So How Do I become a Skywarn Spotter?
Basic spotter training sessions are held every year, usually during February and March in nearly every county we are repsonsible for. A listing of upcoming sessions can be found by clicking on the Event Calendar link on the left side of this screen. The training classes typically take around 2 hours. In order to remain curren, annual refresher training is encouraged. In an effort to maintain an accurate database, spotters that have not received training within 3 years of the their last session will be removed.
Do I get anything at the end of the training session to show I have taken the training?
Some NWS offices issue ID's and/or certificates. However, maintaing such a large database in addition to tracking all the ID's, can be a diffcult task. As a result, this office does not issue ID's or certificates. The host of each training session, typically the county or city Emergency Manager, can issue and track these, at their discretion. We strongly encourage spotters to sign up for sending reports through ESpotter, a web based reporting system. This and other methods of sending reports are listed and described by clicking on the link for Storm Reports on the left side of this page, under Current Hazards.
Brochures Related to this Program
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