Presidents Message
Election Results
Hurricane Ian 
Dues Increase
Community
NWA Foundation Student Night
Memberclicks Member Profile Changes Coming
NWS Needs Your Comments
Seal Recertification 
Mid-Atlantic ChaserCon Press Release
Upcoming Events
Jobs Corner

President's Message
Now that a little time has passed since the annual meeting, I thought it might be fun to revisit some of the content. Fortunately, meeting attendees have access to the content on Whova for 6 months after the meeting. If you registered for the meeting, the presentations will be available in Whova through early February, and the options to interact with other attendees will also be available through early February. 

I recently went back to review some of the showcase presentations I missed. I thought I’d share some of the insights I gained and some of the presentations I found interesting. 

A number of the showcases talked about how to integrate new or different products or technologies to help with existing problems. One of these was Integrating ArcGIS Online and SKYWARN: Creating a More Robust Locally Trained Spotter Network by Jeremy Buckles (NWS Morristown, TN). Their office experienced a lack of spotter training during the pandemic. According to the showcase presentation, their training also suffered from a lack of locally relevant examples. To address some of these issues, they added ArcGIS story maps to their trainings. You can see their story maps at this website.

Applications of Advected Layered Precipitable Water for Winter Storms by Sheldon Kusselson (CIRA) and co-authors was another showcase that described the use of a new product. I have to admit that I was drawn to this presentation by all the pretty images on the title slide. However, I found the images in the presentation useful examples of how the Advected Layered Precipitable Water product, which will become operational in 2023, can be used in various winter precipitation events. They also provided a link to the current 12-hour loop of the ALPW.

Another showcase I enjoyed was GOES Split-window Precipitable Water (SPW) to anticipate severe convection on 3 May 2021 in Texas by Jon Zeitler (NWS Austin-San Antonio) and co-authors. Zeitler et al. provided a case study from the 3 May 2021 severe weather event in central Texas and showed how the Split-window Precipitable Water (SPW) product can be used to help fill in the gaps that exist due to lack of upper-air observations. I thought the presentation was very effective at using animations to show the location of convection and why it favored one area over another. 

Chelsea Peters (NWS Sacramento), in Heat Risk Doesn’t Solve Everything, provided useful insight about how her office identified what their key partners were interested in or had concerns about regarding heat risk. Following this, they came up with a heat risk playbook that helped to answer these concerns or questions. In the playbook, they included items such as definitions, thresholds, or policy recommendations. One thing I don’t think I would have thought to include that I learned their partners wanted was a list of statistics, such as the number of deaths and annual number of warnings issued.  

For a more social-science-y focused presentation, I recommend Tornado Radar Images and Path Directions: Assessing Public Knowledge by Jason Senkbeil (University of Alabama) and myself. I admit I am a little biased about the last showcase presentation because I am a co-author and was very much involved in the project.  An interesting result I think members can take away from this presentation is how our sample thought the higher reflectivity portion of the radar image was the more dangerous part of the storm rather than the area ahead of the hook echo.   

There are many more great showcase presentations and recorded oral presentations on Whova. Check them out while you can! And lastly, if you weren’t able to attend the annual meeting this year, I hope you will start planning now to attend the 2023 meeting in Kansas City September 9-13. 

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Election Results 

Thank you to all candidates who ran for seats on the NWA Board of Directors, and all members who voted in the election.

Congratulations to the following individuals who will begin their terms on January 1, 2023. Bryan Karrick is the 2023 President-Elect. He will serve as president in 2024.

Janice Huff, Amy Sweezey, Morgan Barry and Matt Alto will serve as directors for the years of 2023 through 2025.

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Hurricane Ian

Making landfall as a Category 4 hurricane in southwest Florida on September 28, Ian packed sustained winds of 150+ mph. The result was major storm surge and flooding, significant damage and loss of life. The National Weather Association extends thoughts and prayers for all those affected, and acknowledges the hard work of the forecasters, emergency managers, first responders, and many others who helped–and continue to help–with this event, including those in the affected areas of Puerto Rico and the east United States coast.

Here is a video from NOAA's National Environmental Satellite, Data & Information Service (NESDIS) that provides a visual overview of Hurricane Ian from space.

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Dues Increase

2023 Membership Dues Increase 

In 2019, the NWA decided to slightly increase membership dues each year to cover increasing costs associated with running the association. Then, COVID happened. The decision was made to forego dues increases in 2020 and 2021, because many were dealing with uncertainty related to COVID impacts.

Dues for 2023 will be increased for most members, and smaller increases will be implemented yearly after that. Student, full-time retired, and active military members will not see dues increase.

A new community platform will be available to members very soon. We are in the final stages of testing it and finalizing legal requirements. This will allow members aged 18 and above to network and discuss topics of shared interest. NWA members have embraced the discussion groups on the annual meeting app Whova, so we are excited to make these options available year-round on the new platform.

Corporate members have their company name included on the NWA website, receive discounts on exhibit booths at the annual meeting, and they will now receive complimentary job postings on the NWA Jobs Corner. It has become a popular board to post job openings and internships.

Membership renewals will be available in November. Watch your email for the renewal invoice. The emails will be sent from [email protected].

Thank you for your membership! We look forward to continuing to serve you in 2023.

Janice Bunting
CEO

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