This spring, National Weather Service forecasters participating in the Real-time Phased Array Radar Experiment at the NOAA Hazardous Weather Testbed in Norman, Oklahoma were introduced to PAR data and asked to evaluate its utility for severe weather warning operations in both real-time operations and simulated real-time playback of two archived weather events. During the six-week experiment (28 April through 6 June 2008) 27 participants evaluated the following four aspects of weather surveillance with the PAR: 1) strengths and limitations of PAR data, compared to the WSR-88D, in the analysis of severe storms, 2) how characteristics of PAR scan strategies affect the interpretation of severe storms, 3) how PAR data affects warning decision making, and 4) how PAR data may be of benefit to operational responsibilities. The results of this study will be reported in the extended abstract.
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