Contact: Randee Exler FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
(301) 713-0622 10/27/95
Commerce Secretary Ronald H. Brown, in a report to Congress today, recommended adjustments in the Commerce Department plan to modernize the National Weather Service to ensure better protection for regions where weather services in local areas might be degraded.
The report, prepared by a Commerce Department team of experts, recommends installation of new weather radars, one new weather forecast office, and the continuation of operations for several weather offices and existing radars in regions that include northern Indiana and northwestern Ohio; the Chattanooga, Tenn., and Huntsville, Ala., area; Ft. Smith, Ark., area; Caribou, Maine; Key West, Fla.; and Erie, Pa.
"Our assessment has been exceedingly useful in determining what would be the best plan to ensure the maximum possible protection for the life and property of our citizens," Brown said. "The proposed adjustments will provide the kind of modernization that will help us meet all our weather prediction and warning obligations with the most timely, accurate warnings and forecasts in the world."
The report recommends installation of a WSR-88D radar along with a fully-staffed weather forecast office in the northern Indiana area to provide forecast and warning services to citizens in northern Indiana and northwestern Ohio.
Additionally, it calls for installation of a remotely- linked WSR-88D radar to the southwest of Ft. Smith, Ark., to service the Ft. Smith area, and one in the area between Chattanooga, Tenn., and Huntsville, Ala. In Caribou, Maine, and Key West, Fla., weather office operations will continue until the National Weather Service can ensure reliable communications, maintenance, and community and emergency outreach activities. The report also said existing weather radars should continue in operation in Erie, Pa., and South Bend, Ind., until the weather service completes a study of so-called lake-effect snow on weather conditions. The study is to be completed by January 1998.
Secretary Brown has decided that the weather service office and weather radar in Williston, N.D., will continue to operate for two years while the weather service conducts an operational evaluation to assess if weather radar data and information from other systems provides adequate information to detect, and warn for, all weather phenomena of concern.
"This report represents the culmination of a very thorough, objective and scientific process," Elbert W. Friday Jr., director of the National Weather Service, said. "We now have recommendations that address the concerns of both Congress and the public."
Brown said the weather service's current budget does not provide the resources for additional radars or weather offices beyond those identified in its modernization plan. He said the adjustments recommended in today's report will require additional funding and will be considered as part of the President's deliberations on the fiscal year 1997 budget.
The report was prepared by a Commerce Department team of experts in radar meteorology, operational weather services, employee relations and strategic planning, and was peer reviewed by outside experts.
The report assesses the adequacy of weather radar coverage and weather services for 32 regions in the country that were identified through public comment as "areas of concern" where weather services in those areas might be reduced because of modernization.
The report is in response to a National Research Council study on weather radar coverage and related weather services which was submitted to Congress in June. In that study, the NRC identified specific criteria and procedures that the Commerce Department team applied to the 32 areas of concern to determine if weather services would be degraded as a result of modernization.