EWP daily debrief 5/8

Today we had our first daily debrief with the EWP forecasters.  The forecasters were focused on the San Angelo and Austin, TX areas issuing severe thunderstorm warnings throughout the evening.  We discussed the previous day's activities and asked them a little about what they thought about the product performance during their warning operations...


SATCAST / UW-CTC
- The forecasters created a procedure called "Awesome CI" to complement last year's "Ultimate CI" (which we have made available to the forecasters in AWIPS II) that included the SATCAST product with the UW cloud-top cooling, along with OUN-WRF hourly theta-e and wind fields to combine both observed CI products with some model-based analysis fields... "Helped increase our situational awareness, which was a big plus."
- NWS Charleston forecaster mentioned both CI products back to home office and said they were very excited to look at them.
- "When the (SATCAST) data was coming in there was some positive responses to it... there were consecutive images where there were strong signals and it definitely increased my confidence."
- "With these products, even with training, experience is the key thing to get forecasters to use it."
- "It was nice having both the SATCAST and the CTC, where one is more sensitive and helping identify the area, the other helped key in on those really strong storms that I should be paying attention to."
- Would it have been helpful to see the feedback questions before going into operations to get an idea of what to look for?  "It might have helped direct us."
- "With the CTC, most of the signals were out in W TX and we weren't really looking at the radar, and those strong signals helped."

Nearcast
- Theta-e difference used extensively when storms were already mature... monitored what environment the storms were moving into... helpful in identifying intensification.
- "Could clearly see the boundary between the more stable air and unstable air."
- Couldn't get all the individual field levels in AWIPS II... was only able to get the difference.

Overall / Training
- Would be helpful to get some of the WES procedures built into AWIPS II.
- All these products would be helpful if someone was assisting the warning forecaster looking at these (and other) derived products.
-  Do you feel comfortable with the current training setup, do you want more time with the PIs or material on Monday?  "Getting us into that mindset prior to arrival with the WES case was very beneficial."