Lance Bosart's 20 years of Contributions to Operational Research, Part II: Impacts in the Operational Forecasting Community and Beyond

Motivated by high-impact, low-predictive skill weather events across the Northeast United States, Dr. Lance Bosart has made operationally focused research a hallmark of his nearly 50 year career in meteorology. By establishing a strong, cooperative research relationship between students and faculty at the University at Albany (UAlbany) and forecasters at National Weather Service (NWS) Forecast Office in Albany, New York, as well as other NWS forecast centers and NOAA labs, Lance has been instrumental in transitioning critical research findings pertaining to warm- and cool- season hazardous weather into operations. In this, the second of two posters celebrating Lance’s contributions to research with direct operational application, the impacts of the UAlbany-NWS partnership on the operational weather forecasting community, and beyond, will be reviewed.

Lance is an influential mentor to the many participants who have completed operational research projects as part of the UAlbany-NWS partnership. He created the UAlbany “map” listserv for both real-time and retrospective weather research discussions between participants in the UAlbany-NWS partnership and also among many representatives from all sectors of the weather and climate enterprise. His encouraging and welcoming attitude while moderating the listserv has made it a very popular and active forum utilized by hundreds of scientists, including his former students in academia, the government, broadcast media, and the private sector.

UAlbany-NWS Albany research participants have made successful transitions into careers in all areas of the atmospheric sciences. Many have followed Lance’s example of leading applied research activities and transition of results and applications into forecast operations. A comprehensive historical summary of the impact that the collaborative projects have had on the personal and professional lives of these individuals, their current affiliations, and their contributions to the field will be presented in the poster.