New NHC Policy on Renumbering For 2014

[wxman57]

I'm at the National Hurricane Conference in Orlando, FL this week. Just saw James Franklin's (NHC) talk on invests and renumbering of invests. First of all, James stated that declaration of an invest is often not an indication of development potential. Sometimes a forecaster may simply want to see what the model guidance would say for a disturbance. Sometimes the NHC is simply testing to make sure all systems are "go" for the start of the peak season. All the NHC forecasters have different criteria for declaring an invest. Don't automatically assume that a disturbance is becoming better organized and/or that development chances are increasing should an invest be issued.

The other main issue he addressed was the renumbering statements found on various ftp sites, such as: ftp://ftp.nhc.noaa.gov/atcf/tcweb/

James said that in some cases, the NHC renumbers a disturbance so that the forecaster can pre-prepare an advisory just in case new data, perhaps from recon, confirms that a TD/TS has formed. Occasionally, the forecaster will change his mind once new data arrive and a disturbance will not be upgraded. The problem, he said, is that these renumber statements were getting out to the public and the media were latching onto them as a "fact" that the NHC had upgraded a disturbance.

Because of this, these renumber statements will no longer be made public on the ftp site. They'll be kept internal to the NHC.

[crownweather]

Any word on limiting or banning the track guidance from the public and keeping that internal?

[wxman57]

Any word on limiting or banning the track guidance from the public and keeping that internal?

The only track guidance being withheld will be the ECMWF and the Florida State Super Ensemble (FSSE). I received a high-res copy of a sample inundation graphic for the upper Texas coast. I'll only post the link below as the file size is 4MB:

http://home.comcast.net/~cgh57/UpperTexasSurge.jpg

What is displayed is the 10% exceedence values rather than a deterministic surge forecast. The reason for this is that there is so much uncertainty in track forecasts that a deterministic surge forecast has a high probability of being wrong. These graphics will be issued once a watch or warning exists for a coastal location. I asked Jamie Rhome of the NHC about issuing these graphics at 72 hours out and they are considering this (not for 2014) because many cities need to start evacuations at 72 hours.

[RL3AO]

Well we're at least partly to blame for that.

[RL3AO]

Any word on limiting or banning the track guidance from the public and keeping that internal?

If you're talking about the GFS/NAM/Other NCEP data, that would be illegal for the government to withhold that data. Its in the public domain since we (taxpayer) paid for it.

[supercane4867]

Will the fix data still be made available? It's probably the only site to see realtime T-numbers from TAFB

http://ftp.nhc.noaa.gov/atcf/fix/

[wxman57]

Will the fix data still be made available? It's probably the only site to see realtime T-numbers from TAFB

http://ftp.nhc.noaa.gov/atcf/fix/

James didn't say anything about fix data, just the renumber messages will be stripped off the ftp servers.

[tolakram]

So because it was misused by the media they think hiding it is the right decision? That never works out well, especially when messing around with tax payer funded systems. They don't have to provide a renumber, but will they also have to deal with 97 becoming 1 on the best track data? Does it wind its way on up the chain?

Never turns out well.

[Yellow Evan]

My thoughts as well. It's the media problem IMO that they are regarding theses statements as unofficial. not the NHC's.

Back to the pre-2010 era, were we had to wait for the advisory and rely on the NRL to leak out the information.

[Alyono]

So because it was misused by the media they think hiding it is the right decision? That never works out well, especially when messing around with tax payer funded systems. They don't have to provide a renumber, but will they also have to deal with 97 becoming 1 on the best track data? Does it wind its way on up the chain?

Never turns out well.

There are plenty of tax payer funded things that the public has no right to see. The tax payer argument is simply not a valid one.

Fortunately, NHC releases more data than Jakarta does for TCs

[tolakram]

So because it was misused by the media they think hiding it is the right decision? That never works out well, especially when messing around with tax payer funded systems. They don't have to provide a renumber, but will they also have to deal with 97 becoming 1 on the best track data? Does it wind its way on up the chain?

Never turns out well.

There are plenty of tax payer funded things that the public has no right to see. The tax payer argument is simply not a valid one.

Fortunately, NHC releases more data than Jakarta does for TCs

I don't think it's a valid argument either, but I think that the past shows us how releasing LESS information rarely if ever leads to the intended consequence and usually ends up creating more problems than it solves. In other words, from a logical perspective, what problem are they trying to solve and what evidence do they have that the solution to be used is a good one? I should have left the taxpayer argument out of it.

Time will tell, but I hope we don't go through a period of agencies reducing info releases and blaming it on media.

[RL3AO]

Whats cycloneye gonna do with his extra 10 hours a week not spent refreshing for the renumber?

[WeatherGuesser]

but I think that the past shows us how releasing LESS information rarely if ever leads to the intended consequence and usually ends up creating more problems than it solves.



Time will tell, but I hope we don't go through a period of agencies reducing info releases and blaming it on media.

I know you're specifically referring to NWS, but we're already well into a period of other government agencies at all levels withholding information from taxpayers. Consider all the public service agencies going digital/encrypted in their comms.


Back to topic, sort of ... the media could do a much better job of educating the public when using this type of data if they would focus on doing so rather than garnering ratings and page views.

Even people on this board tend to get into dramatics when posting information instead of explaining what it means. Sure, it's a focused site and most people are in the business somehow, even if only as hobbyists, but the board is open to public view and there are a lot of us less educated readers who are usually left in the dark reading what appears to be something in a foreign language punctuated with bold and colors.

[terstorm1012]

I'm cool with this.

There seems to be a certain...incuriousity amongst some media these days. How many times have we all howled when a story about some "invest" pops up, or a model run makes them freak out.

[jeff]

Any word on limiting or banning the track guidance from the public and keeping that internal?

The only track guidance being withheld will be the ECMWF and the Florida State Super Ensemble (FSSE). I received a high-res copy of a sample inundation graphic for the upper Texas coast. I'll only post the link below as the file size is 4MB:

http://home.comcast.net/~cgh57/UpperTexasSurge.jpg

What is displayed is the 10% exceedence values rather than a deterministic surge forecast. The reason for this is that there is so much uncertainty in track forecasts that a deterministic surge forecast has a high probability of being wrong. These graphics will be issued once a watch or warning exists for a coastal location. I asked Jamie Rhome of the NHC about issuing these graphics at 72 hours out and they are considering this (not for 2014) because many cities need to start evacuations at 72 hours.

I believe the sample SE TX graphic is from an Ike advisory package. Don't be fooled by the "lack" of inland inundation west of Galveston Bay. The new maps are created based on the forecast package and will lag the official advisory by about 45 minutes and as mentioned above are considered the "worst case" for that storm at that time based on the upper 10% exceedence. They are also referenced above ground level and not above sea level which should help reduce some of the public confusion over MSL and datums.

[wxman57]

I believe the sample SE TX graphic is from an Ike advisory package. Don't be fooled by the "lack" of inland inundation west of Galveston Bay. The new maps are created based on the forecast package and will lag the official advisory by about 45 minutes and as mentioned above are considered the "worst case" for that storm at that time based on the upper 10% exceedence. They are also referenced above ground level and not above sea level which should help reduce some of the public confusion over MSL and datums.

No, it's definitely not from Ike. I talked to James Franklin about the relatively low inundation in the HOU-GLS area. These graphics are different from SLOSH in that they do consider the forecast track. While there are multiple track projections used to generate the surge map, they're concentrated around the forecast track using 3 different sized storms at different forward speeds. For the sample graphic, the storm was predicted to make landfall near Beaumont, not where Ike hit. You can tell because of the relatively low inundation in Galveston Bay. If the example storm had been forecast to hit Galveston then the inundation in BPT-LCH area would have been a good bit lower and the surge into GLS much higher.

[ROCK]

That looks like IKE surge map to me...just saying... would have been nice to see a surge map of a cat 4 into San Luis Pass moving NW....now that is worst case scenario!!

[Chris_in_Tampa]

After 90E last week the "tcweb" directory was removed from the NHC's server. Now I have to update my site to handle the change. I'm betting there are a lot of other sites that will need to do the same.