Contextualizing, Collaborating on, and Conveying NWS Information with Geographic Information Systems (GIS)

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) enable partnerships and data sharing between government, industry, non-profit organizations and academia by leveraging Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards. Most NWS Weather-Ready Nation partners and ambassadors use GIS to communicate information to their staff and constituents. The NWS Dissemination Office has been working for the last five years to build a robust framework for providing NWS data products as OGC web services. While this work continues, NWS is also participating in collaboration projects focused on easier discovery and access for GIS data to support disaster preparedness, response, recovery and resilience. Included in these efforts are web-based interactive maps to display radar and other decision support service information. Attendees of this session will learn about what NOAA's National Weather Service (NWS) is doing to contribute to these projects while continuing to use GIS to contextualize and convey NWS data through GIS technology and standards.