Originally posted by Mike Umscheid+--><div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Mike Umscheid)</div>
That's not the forecaster, that's the IFPS formatters that produce the zones from the grids. We're told to keep hand editing to a minimum.
We don't like it any more than you do.
The NWS has higher priority in the NDFD database, and all the derived graphical and text products that are associated that are seen on almost all NWS field office sites. I'm pretty sure all NWS sites have the experimental text forecast product online, which is a point forecast text product taken straight from the grid point. The ZFP, however, is an areal forecast product, and thus text formatters had to have been developed to take a grouping of gridded information and put words to it... which is more difficult than making words from just one point. We are in a bit of a quagmire in this regard, because text formatters for the ZFP is like a science. It's quite intimidating, and I know a little bit about Python.
The direction of the NWS is the NDFD database, and, in time, all other products will be generated directly from the grids...operationally, not just experimentally. It will take time. The ZFP, in time (probably a long time though), will eventually go away...thus not a lot of time is taken to manual tweak wording. Get the gridded database fit to your (collaborated) forecast, and all is good. That's the 1st priority. The only "areal" product we would continue producing in the (distant?) future would be the SAF, produced for CRS only for weather radio. There's certainly a long way to go in this "digital" modernization still, but we are coming along...
Mike U[/b]