National Weather Service Anchorage Pathways Project Summer 2018: Implementation of an Impacts Catalog and Communipedia

As the National Weather Service works to expand its ability to provide Impact Decision-based Support Services (IDSS), the need for a comprehensive resource covering weather impacts has become increasingly apparent. Although some forecast offices are using the IRIS database to catalog weather impacts, the Anchorage Forecast Office recognized an internal need to capture weather-related impacts that are independent of other community events. An additional challenge for Anchorage Forecasters is collecting the knowledge necessary to connect with customers in a broad geographic and culturally diverse region. An event-independent Impacts Catalog will allow forecasters to easily add and extract community information and weather impacts from the catalog, as they utilize the system to forecast and communicate potential impacts to Core Partners.

The streamlined version of the Impacts Catalog focuses specifically on the meteorological event including its hazards, operators and parameters. The Alaska-focused design is the first instance that this information has been aligned with forecast zones, contact information of decision makers and pertinent information for each community. This poster presentation will focus on the outcomes and future goals of this Impacts Catalog as it operationally benefits both Anchorage and the Alaska region for their unique challenges.