[EAS] National Weather Service Message Flooding

[Clay Freinwald]

Mike - 

We looked at doing that many years ago in this area - The major problem is
that the County Sub-Divisions, and county boundaries for that matter, don't
line up with the NWS Forecast Zones.    The other issue is that most folks
barely understand what county they are in...much less what portion of the
county.    If you said SW Ajax County there would those that would say 'Huh'
or maintain they are in South Ajax County etc.  You flat-landers have it
easy....You ought to be here were mountains have a bit impact on weather.
And, let's not forget that counties are not universally rectangular, nor the
same size.  Take a look at San Bernardino in California or Brewster in
Texas.

Clay

Mike wrote - 

Maybe it might be time to press for implementation of the county
subdivisions. The subdivisions being more geopolitical or conditions based
than simply geographical.  Such as a major city being it's own subdivision
within a county. Or a valley between mountain ranges. I will say the NWS is
now including more specific municipal and congregation points in their
warning's text.  Which is a good thing for folks and visitors not familiar
with a given area.

It also may be time to revisit the criteria for issuing some warnings. 
This past summer, the vast majority of SVR warnings here were based on
WSR-88D observations and algorithm product alerts. In the vast majority of
those warnings, particularly wide swath warnings, ground verification
meeting the SVR criteria were limited in scope and breadth. Further,
sequenntial wide swath SVR's provided even less or still limited ground
truth verification over the warned area.

The same could be said for blizzards. Last year saw more Blizzard Warnings
in a season than I can remember.  And except for one, all of them issued for
around here saw Winter Storm Warning criteria barely met...or not.

I agree it's a double edge sword paradox. But at some point, another Joplin
will occur. And one can only wonder what will come of it given the public's
senses dulled by the flood of SVR's. That when a TOR is issued based on
ground verification, they won't take heed of the distinction. The $64,000
question is how changes can be made without necessarily increasing risk as
well as minimizing the costs to make the changes.

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