Using 'Particularly Dangerous Situation" Wording to Improve Public Response to National Weather Service Watches and Warnings

Response to weather warnings is essential for protection of life and property. As such, National Weather Service warnings are designed to stimulate an appropriate public response to weather hazards.

The purpose of this presentation is to propose an alternative to the current warning headlines. Since warning headlines are fundamentally critical for eliciting public action that leads to saving lives, we believe they must be updated to reflect our increasing scientific ability to discriminate more seriously threatening life and property events from those that cause lesser amounts of damage.

The use of Particularly Dangerous Situation (PDS) Tornado Watches has achieved success in discriminating more violent tornado events. Since PDS watches have provided useful guidance to the public in focusing their attention, we believe the use of PDS warnings would also enhance public response to a hazardous weather event. The use of PDS warning headlines does not need to be restricted to convective events. Rather, PDS warnings could be ubiquitously applied to a host of NWS warnings, including ice storms, flood, temperature, or high wind events.

NOTE: The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the position of the National Weather Service.