I'll be giving a talk at the Varna Volunteer Fire Company next Thursday, January 26th, at 7:30pm, on local weather, weather forecasting, and their relationship to emergency services. I'm planning to start with a look at some of Dryden's past weather disasters, and then explore what current weather forecasting can do (and can't do).
We like to think that we live in a place where the weather is always interesting but rarely extreme. While it's true that we don't have hurricanes coming on shore here or large bursts of tornadoes, we still do have hurricanes, tornados, blizzards, freezing rain, hail, microbursts, floods, high winds, heat waves, and more. This area combines huge microclimate variations with a mix of weather coming from the interior of North America, the Arctic, and the Atlantic.
A key part of the talk will be exploring ways to get (and interpret) weather information and ways to give back weather information. The vast amount of weather information available today is fantastic, but it also has limitations. Those limitations are both warnings to us to use it cautiously and an opportunity for us to help contribute.
The talk is a training talk, but free and open to the public. It'll be about a 45-minute talk with additional time for questions and discussion.
(I'm a supporting member of the VVFC, and they had me take a Weather Spotter class last spring, which spurred my interest.)
Posted by simon at January 20, 2012 7:08 AM in emergency services , weather