NHC director Bill Proenza under fire
New National Hurricane Center director Bill Proenza is in hot water for his outspoken criticism of his bosses, according to Miami Herald stories published in the past few days. The acting head of the National Weather Service, Mary Glackin, visited his office in Miami Friday and handed him a three-page letter of reprimand. Proenza shared the contents of the letter with his staff and the media, a pretty gutsy move for a guy just appointed to the job. However, Proenza's boss, Ms. Glackin, is on the job for just a few more months--on September 2, Jack Hayes takes over as boss of the National Weather Service. Proenza can probably get away with his criticism of his bosses while there a major shake up at the top. See the View From the Surface blog this week for further speculations, and for any follow-up articles that might be published on this topic.
Figure 1. The NASA QuikSCAT satellite. Image credit: NASA Earth Observatory.
Replacement for the aging QuikSCAT satellite?
Proenza has been particularly outspoken in his desire to see a replacement for the aging QuikSCAT satellite, which measures surface winds over remote ocean areas, and has been credited with improving 72-hour hurricane track forecasts by 16%. His comments may be having an effect. On May 24, the improved Hurricane Tracking and Forecasting Act of 2007 (Senate Bill S. 1509) was introduced before the Senate. The bill, introduced by Sen. Landrieu, D-LA, and co-sponsored by John Kerry and Florida's two senators, asks for $375 million to build a replacement for the QuikSCAT satellite. Bravo to Mr. Proenza for speaking out on this important issue! Some excepts from the bill:
(5) The QuikSCAT satellite was built in just 12 months and was launched with a 3-year design life, but continues to perform per specifications, with its backup transmitter, as it enters into its 8th year--5 years past its projected lifespan.
(6) The QuikSCAT satellite provides daily coverage of 90 percent of the world's oceans, and its data has been a vital contribution to National Weather Service forecasts and warnings over water since 2000.
(7) Despite its continuing performance, the QuikSCAT satellite is well beyond its expected design life and a replacement is urgently needed because, according to the National Hurricane Center, without the QuikSCAT satellite--
(A) hurricane forecasting would be 16 percent less accurate 72 hours before hurricane landfall and 10 percent less accurate 48 hours before hurricane landfall resulting in--
(i) with a 16 percent loss of accuracy at 72 hours before landfall, the area expected to be under hurricane danger would rise from 197 miles to 228 miles on average; and
(ii) with a 10 percent loss of accuracy at 48 hours before landfall, the area expected to be under hurricane danger would rise from 136 miles to 150 miles on average; and
(B) greater inaccuracy of this type would lead to more `false alarm' evacuations along the Gulf Coast and Atlantic Coast and decrease the possibility of impacted populations sufficiently heeding mandatory evacuations.
The bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, and awaits consideration there. The Chair of that committee is Senator Inouye from hurricane-prone Hawaii, so the bill has a decent chance of making it out of committee to the Senate floor. If your senator is on the committee, please write them to let them know what you think about the bill:
Democrats:
Chairman Daniel K. Inouye (HI)
John D. Rockefeller, IV (WV)
John F. Kerry (MA)
Byron L. Dorgan (ND)
Barbara Boxer (CA)
Bill Nelson (FL)
Maria Cantwell (WA)
Frank R. Lautenberg (NJ)
Mark Pryor (AR)
Thomas Carper (DE)
Claire McCaskill (MO)
Amy Klobuchar (MN)
Republicans:
Vice Chairman Ted Stevens (AK)
John McCain (AZ)
Trent Lott (MS)
Kay Bailey Hutchison (TX)
Olympia J. Snowe (ME)
Gordon H. Smith (OR)
John Ensign (NV)
John E. Sununu (NH)
Jim DeMint (SC)
David Vitter (LA)
John Thune (SD)
There is no activity in the tropical Atlantic worth mentioning, and none of the computer models are forecasting any development over the coming week. I'll have a new blog on Wednesday.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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holy crap, one little report and everyone is pissy that the season will be a bust, get a grip
Not me, I'd rather it be zero hurricanes every year!
Here is to hoping, anyway. :) paula
& way to go Bill Nelson, I'll have to drop him an e-mail.
('Let the Sunshine In...')
Great letter of support from Bill Nelson.
I love it when powerful people do the right thing.
hooo's bored. its a holiday here ( labour day ). There's people marching about in the hotsun, calling for bread and justice. ( wonder what it all means, actualy ) As for me, I've had a couple of cold beers, a lunch of grilled kingfish, and its almost siesta time. Right after this cup of fresh ground coffee.
Hope everyone has a similiar day.
...disgusting, Pottery!!! (LOL)kidding...glad you're enjoying life there. Keep enjoying your day. Thanks for watching the tropics for all us and keeping us posted!
What we are seeing right now for the month of June is NORMAL! We shouldn't even be worrying about major hurricanes until August if things remain normal. Quite frankly, I don't buy any of these so called "professional" seasonal forecasts because every damn one of them revise their picks monthly.
There will be storms. There will be major hurricanes. Hopefully, none will affect land.
hang in there bro.
Today's Atlantic Wind Shear to bring you up Nash..
May I remind you that it only takes one hurricane to make it a bad season, there was nothing in the report saying any future storm was a fish storm, only cooling of SSTs, this does not mean that every storm will just go to sea. Hope they do though.
Even Dr. Masters has hinted that everything is setting up like last season.All fish storms.
help, I have not idea how the season will play out, but I can tell you it is nothing like last year. We will either be in La Nina or Enso Neutral conditions which tend to lead to more devleopment in the Atl. Last year we were in an El Nino which tends to lead to less activity in the Atl.
Back to work.
See y'all tonight. hoipe everyone listens to Proenza.
With Thanks in advance.....
hey bama...i like the idea of throwing all the ice in the atlantic...but what would be left to keep my beer cold?
Dont worry....thats why we will do it on July 5th. Everyone should be pretty happy after the 4th so we will have a day or two to make more!!
Is it just a coincidence that the featured article today on NOAA's site is about its great tropical storm satellites, including the QuikSCAT? LouisC
I think it's called 'damage control...' Others might call it 'smoke screen...'
June 19, 2007
Proenza's QuikSCAT claims questioned
Mary Glackin has been doing some damage control.
The acting director of the National Weather Service flew from Washington, D.C., to South Florida last week to tell the South Florida Sun-Sentinels Editorial Board that she isnt buying what Bill Proenza is selling, which is that if the QuikSCAT satellite fails, hurricane forecasts would be hurt significantly.
Specifically, Proenza, director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami-Dade County, says three-day forecasts would deteriorate by 16 percent and two-day forecasts would slip by 10 percent.
Im not willing to stand by these numbers, Glackin said.
She said she resented some observers -- mainly Wayne Sallade, emergency manager in Charlotte County -- implying the hurricane center would be flying blind if the satellite dies.
That so far from the truth, she said.
According to Glackin, hurricane forecasts would be affected, but not much, if QuikSCAT fails.
She said hurricane track forecasts would remain fairly accurate because of several other technological tools. These include a European satellite that was recently launched, as well as geostationary satellites that feed back data every few minutes as opposed to every 18 hours for QuikSCAT.
Interestingly, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which oversees the weather service, on Monday put a story on its Web site, detailing how various satellites will provide hurricane forecasters this season with "a steady stream of crisp, detailed images and other important data."
(Glackin, by the way, is a friendly and rather soft-spoken woman, who has been with the weather service for 22 years and will be acting director for only three months before Jack Hayes, the permanent one, takes over.)
QuikSCAT is a research satellite that forecasters say provides a broad-brush look at a storm and its atmosphere, allowing more accurate forecasts. The problem is that it was launched in 1999 with a five-year life expectancy and is now operating on borrowed time.
Proenza says he is concerned. And he criticized his superiors at NOAA for not planning ahead and launching a replacement satellite by now. (NOAA says it likely will be seven years before it launches a replacement for QuikSCAT.)
In doing so, he poked his superiors in the eye and touched off an interesting tiff.
For starters, he received a three-page letter last week from Glackin, saying he was causing confusion about the centers ability to forecast storms. Although characterized as a reprimand in media reports, Glackin says the letter instead clarifies her expectations.
Proenza responded that Glackin was attempting to muzzle him and setting him up to possibly lose his job.
Glackin said Proenza is in no danger of getting canned. But she added that she feels his comments about QuikSCAT came at an inopportune time, when a very active hurricane season is forecast.
We need the American public to have confidence in our service and take our forecasts seriously, she said.
All of this prompted U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson to jump into the fray. He wrote Carlos M. Gutierrez, top administrator of the U.S. Department of Commerce, saying Proenza should have been commended, not reprimanded.
Dr. Proenza is now paying the price for his principled actions, Nelson wrote. Clearly there are parties within NOAA who dont appreciate having their shortcomings identified to the public and Congress.
Meanwhile, it's interesting that Proenza's initial complaints were directed at NOAA's top brass, meaning its top administrator Conrad C. Lautenbacher Jr. -- and Lautenbacher has basically remained quiet other than to say during a press conference awhile back that the agency "loves" Proenza for speaking his mind.
Stay tuned. The QuikSCAT affair continues.
Ken Kaye
Feel free to check out my blog ... If you want...
a href=http://www.wunderground.com/radar/radblast.aspzoommode=zoom&num=6&delay=15&rbscale=0.3145978260 869565&scale=0.515&noclutter
its been teasing me all day.
I read that article on the NOAA page. Link Seems like they are trying to downplay Quikstat as more of a research thing than an actual forcecasting tools.
...Bama, hope you get some rain, we've been getting a good bit today, thank goodness. We surely need it!
lmao slow?
yeah ok, I dont think its gonna be slow
10 storms is average, 5 is slow lol
and I still think we will get at least 16
holy crap, one little report and everyone is pissy that the season will be a bust, get a grip
anyway back to work
Wow JP i could not say it better myself........
No problem and yeah I liked that book as well.
Cape Verde storms are storms (Hurricanes) that start from tropical waves just off the coast of Africa, since the waves usually start near the "Cape Verde Islands", this how they get that name. This is different that the storms that form in the carribean. I'm sure there is better explanation out there...
I don't know how you can say this year will be like 2006. Can someone show me in history where two years were the "same" back to back? 2004 and 2005 were active and devasting years, but were vastly different nonetheless. Although this year COULD turn out to be less active, the current trend of the year so far seems to dictate otherwise. What I mean by that is storms that shouldn't have formed did, while in 2006 storms that SHOULD have formed fizzled out. Personally, if you want "excitement" than let the bermuda high setup FAR FAR EAST and let the fish storms roll.
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