NOAA Severe Weather Warnings to Become More Precise, Specific

On Thursday, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA) announced that its National Weather Service will begin issuing more geographically specific warnings for tornadoes, severe thunderstorms, floods, and marine hazards beginning on October 1st.

These new "storm-based warnings" will allow forecasters to pinpoint the specific area where the threats are highest.

These new storm-based warnings will be displayed graphically while being extremely adaptable to cell phones, PDAs, and the Internet. With the Emergency Alert System geared toward counties, NOAA's Weather Radio All Hazards will still send out an alarm if there is a warning anywhere in a county. But the text and audio messages will provide more specific information about where in the county the storm is as well as its trajectory.

Storm-based warnings will reference landmarks like highways, shopping centers, and parks while using directional delimiters to indicate county location.

"By focusing the threat, we can reduce the warned area by as much as 70 percent, which equates to more than $100 million in savings to the public. The real bottom line is that this will potentially save more lives. Eliminating areas needlessly warned builds confidence that you do indeed need to take action when a warning is issued," said Vice Admiral Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr., under secretary of commerce for oceans and atmosphere and NOAA administrator.

"These are potentially deadly, short duration events that can develop very rapidly. Our technology has evolved to support better
warnings, and we are adapting to meet public expectation to receive weather information on demand," adds Vickie Nadolski, acting deputy director of NOAA's National Weather Service.