Major giant hail event in Southern Brazil - South America

[Alexandre Aguiar]

Hello Jim,
No Brazilian government agency adopts the EF or F scale for rating damage caused by tornadoes/severe_storms. In fact, there is no Brazilian agency **regulating** damage assessments associated with severe weather events in that country.

What happens is that there is a team of researchers -- which only very recently became part of a national research institute in southern Brazil -- that has been conducting damage assessments for a while and have gained lots of experience doing that. They are doing a fantastic job, but as yet their effort does not represent a truly official tornado damage assessment. I do believe (and hope) that this initiave, still in "research mode", will lead to a regulation on tornado/storm damage assessment in Brazil in the future, which may or may not adopt the EF scale. So we cannot say that in Brasil the EF scale is adopted.
Cheers!
Ernani

This team of researchers is the Group of Natural Disasters - South for the National Institute of Space Studies, one of the Brazilian government weather agencies. Two national governamental institutions forecast weather and climate in Brazil. One of them is the National Institute of Space Studies (INPE).

 

[Ernani Nascimento]

This team of researchers is the Group of Natural Disasters - South for the National Institute of Space Studies, one of the Brazilian government weather agencies. Two national governamental institutions forecast weather and climate in Brazil. One of them is the National Institute of Space Studies (INPE).

Hi Alexandre!
Well, I don't know if in your reply you agree or not with what I say in my message.

But if the question is "Is the EF scale offically adopted Brazil?" the answer is "no" because, in contrast with other countries (at least USA and Canada, and maybe Australia and very few others), there is no regulation in Brazil stating who is responsible for conducting the damage assessments, the methodology and criteria to be used in those assessments, and what damage scale should be adopted.

The INPE-Sul research team still performs the damage assessments in a research mode (and they **are** attempting to employ the EF scale), and this is why they refer to their initiative as a project in their web page. But what is a project today may become an official "operational procedure" in the future. This is my hope. Then the weather centers (INPE-CPTEC and INMET, the latter being the official Brazilian National Weather Service) could report results of the damage assessments performed by the team responsible for that activity. I do not know if or when this is going to happen.

I have been visiting Metsul's webpage frequently to know what is going on in terms of severe weather in Brazil/Argentina. Keep the good job!

 

[Alexandre Aguiar]

I agree. I just clarified that they are not independent researchers, but part of one of the two goverment's weather centers. As their reports come under the seal of the institution, I presume its is the "official assessment". By the way, I hate that expression "official". Officialy, it snow in Southern Brazil in just 6 towns on September 4th 2006, but the event was observed in near 100cities. As "official weather" in Brazil does take in account any weather observation out of the government stations, some historical events as snowstorms of the past are much better reported by press than by weather records. Another point. A frequently expression in the media: "the official lowest temperature". If a weather station maintained by SIMEPAR records 40 degrees and the highest temperature recorded by INMET is 37, the media will report the official high of 37. So, the 40 degrees record does not count. It is an absurd. But we hear that in the media everyday. For example, here in Porto Alegre we are tracjing rainfall in ten points of the cities. But always the local media reports: "it rained 40 milimeters in the official station", despite records of 60, 70, 80 mm all over town.

 

[Ernani Nascimento]

I agree. I just clarified that they are not independent researchers, but part of one of the two goverment's weather centers. As their reports come under the seal of the institution, I presume its is the "official assessment".

INPE-Sul is not a weather center, but this is not the point because tornado damage assessment does not have to be an activity of a weather center. The point is: the tornado damage assessment conducted by INPE-Sul is part of a project. If another group from any other federal institution decides to perform their own assessment with a completely different methodology (even for the same event) and using, say, the TORRO scale they can. There is nothing avoiding that. So is the EF-scale the brazilian choice for a tornado damage assessment scale? No. INPE-Sul adopts it in their project.

I just replied to an earlier comment that also mentioned the fact that Canada **offcially** decided not to adopt the EF scale. This is the relevant perspective for comparison here.

Sorry, but the other things that you bring up address a completely different issue from what I wanted to clarify, and thus I am no going to post any oppinion on that.

Cheers.

 

[Alexandre Aguiar]

INPE-Sul is not a weather center, but this is not the point because tornado damage assessment does not have to be an activity of a weather center.

I agree INPE-Sul is not a weather center in Brazil, but it is a branch of a weather institution. Sorry you didn't adress the other point I made. It would be nice to know your opinion on the matter in this forum dedicated to debate weather issues.