Week 3 concluded out West, with participants forecasting for the Boise and Pendleton CWA's. Severe activity was once again marginal, but there were enough storms to keep participants busy evaluating the products.
LAP
- Values (where we had retrievals) matched NUCAPS, which matched with modified observed soudings and observed soundings throughout the week.
- LAP retrievals seemed to correct underdone GFS CAPE throughout the week.
- It was helpful to have PW broken up into a few layers
- Layer PW gives you a good sense of where differential moisture advection is occurring.
- I liked that GFS filled the gaps in retrievals. It was also nice to compare the retrieval data and model data.
CI
- I would load it in my office; the information was useful.
- The regular CI product performed great this week.
- CI trained your eye to focus on areas of cloud development. I used it several times for situational awareness. It gave a lot of lead-time in DC, where it told me to watch that area prior to development.
- I see this being greatly improved with 5-min updates from GOES-R
- Generally we all liked the display.
ProbSevere
- The display made sense, and I adapted to it fast
- Ideas for predictors that might improve probabilities include: low-level divergence signature in velocity data for wind events, DCAPE for wind, surface-based theta-e for derechos, surface cold pool difference for wind.
- All said that it would be helpful to have the probability broken down be severe threat. They would load it as a 4-panel.
- Loved it, great tool
It tends to blend together nearby storms.
- With the storm on the west side of DC, we had a storm split, but ProbSevere grouped the storms together, so it was unclear from which cell the information was coming.
- I would like it to be able to differentiate storms, especially in linear events.
- There is already getting to be a lot of information in the readout, adding more might get to be a lot. It would be a good idea to color the data, or make the output selectable by the user.
- On marginal days, it confirmed what we were thinking about the storms.
- On one of the marginal days, we warned on a storm that reached 50%. It seems like you need to guage the threshold for each particular day
- ProbSevere and lightning jump give you added confidence to issue warnings or continue warnings if on the bubble. Good warning decision tools.
SRSOR
- We would like to have both the regular imagery and Parallax-correct imagery available to us. There were cases when it helped but also a case where it hurt.
- I wish the 1-min imagery was available more often.
- I can't wait to get this from GOES-R
- I think this will be beneficial for tracking the development and evolution of lake effect snow, where you have low-topped, but intense growth. For me this will be the case on Lake Michigan.
- I see myself using the 1-min imagery during warning operations.
- I compared satellite and radar imagery side-by-side. This allowed me to match storms, and compare storm behavior in the two.
- I overlayed IR and visible imagery. This allowed me to see cloud top trends, temperatures, etc plus the detail in one panel.
- I loaded warning polygons on the srsor imagery. This allowed me to match with storms in radar more easily.
- I could see a visible cloud line along the rear flank downdraft.
- We depended on the 1-min imagery even more when we were operating out west.
SRSOR winds
- Participants would like having a gridded analysis of these winds, in addition to the wind barbs themselves. Fields like wind speed, divergence, and vorticity would be helpful. It is sometimes difficult to visualize these fields from just the barbs.
- On Monday in W Maryland, I could see low-level mass flux occuring in the vicinity of a cloud line. It was nice to quantify it with the winds.
- It would be nice to somehow automate the computation of layer shear.
Lightning Jump
- ProbSevere and Lightning Jumps give you added confidence to issue warnings or continue warnings if on the bubble. These are good warning decision tools.
- I would like to see how negative jumps correlate to echo top collapses.
- I like the colors. They grab my attention. The upper threshold should be increased.
NUCAPS
- It would be neat to add winds to the profile. Some sources could be surface obs and satellite derived winds.
- We would like to see the surface modifications be automated.
- It was helpful to have the plan view displays. I would like to see fields like theta-e, cape, pw, height of freezing level, height of -20C level
General
- All commented that they enjoyed the experience, and it was just the right amount of products to evaluate.
- It would be nice to have a WES case for slower days.
- After initial assessment before convection starts, have a group briefing to see what the two groups were observing.
- Broadcaster said it was a great experience, and it was beneficial to work alongside the NWS forecasters.
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