Generating In-Flight Hazard Information Using AWIPS Hazard Services

Hazard Services is making progress toward streamlining National Weather Service operations by integrating software tools into a common interface for issuing timely and accurate hazard information within AWIPS. Streamlining a suite of in-flight products into a common aviation production platform (CAPP) for the three Meteorological Watch Office’s (MWOs) has been a significant part of this progress.

The software allows the three MWOs (i.e. Aviation Weather Center, Alaska Aviation Weather Unit, and the National Weather Service Honolulu Weather Forecast Office) to create and issue 4-dimensional guidance for en-route aircraft for the following products: Volcanic Ash Advisory, Convective SIGMET, International SIGMET, and AIRMET. Creating these products using Hazard Services improves forecaster efficiency while allowing forecasters to focus on the problem of the day. The CAPP also allows MWOs to provide back-up services to each other, which they are currently unable to do efficiently, and collaborate with field offices before products are issued.

This presentation will provide an overview of Hazard Services development for aviation, and will include a sampling of applications using the four in-flight products. Applications to be explored include generating hazardous information using high-resolution model output, gridded forecaster data from the graphical forecast editor (GFE), and a range of observational datasets. Advantages of using Hazard Services for messaging, decision support, and flexible formatting outputs will also be explored.