Without much promotion (so perhaps you've missed it), we have created a new section on our weather pages that I think some of you will find both interesting and helpful. We have titled that new section "Advanced Forecasting" and it is a collection, on one web page, of most of the NOAA National Weather Service main websites. To be sure, you can access any of these directly, but we're got them all collected on one page for your convenience. Starting with this blog, I'm going to take you through the various sites linked from our new page, with abrief explanation of what you can find by accessing those sites.  

Storm Prediction Center. This specialized forecast center, located in Norman, Oklahoma, is the source of severe weather forecast products, including outlooks extending out one week; severe thunderstorm and tornado watches, normally covering time periods of around six hours; mesoscale discussions, issued to point out areas where weather conditions are or may become critical over periods shorter than watches, a watch-warning-advisory display showing (by county outline) all watches, warnings or advisories currently in effect; preliminary storm reports, showing the location of reported severe werather events and a brief description; a mesoanalysis section, allowing anyone access to some of the tools used by the S.P.C. forecasters; and a fire weather section, becauase the S.P.C. is also responsible for monitoring and forecasting widespread conditions favoring wildfires.

Text Data Texas. Quick access to most text products issued by N.W.S. forecast offices in Texas (or those in adjacent states that have some Texas counties in their jurisdiction).  Zone forecasts, forecast discussions, hourly temperature reports, climate data, warnings and advisories, and watches (including both severe storm and winter weather) are readily available from this section.

National Hurricane Center. This specialized forecast center, located in Miami, Florida, is co-located with the Tropical Prediction Center and several other NOAA/NWS offices. N.H.C. is probably best known for issuing advisories, watches and warnings on tropical cyclones (tropical depressions, tropical storms and hurricanes) that develop in the Atlantic Basin (the Atlantic Ocean, Caribbean Sea, and Gulf of Mexico). This center also issues Tropical Weather Outlooks several times per day during the tropical season that runs from June 1st to November 30th each year. These products point out areas where tropical cyclones may be about to develop. The N.H.C. also issues those same products for the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of the U.S. and Mexico.

Later this week I'll explain some of the others. We hope you will take advantage of this new tool found in our weather section. And please feel free to let us know what you think!