Reliability of Severe Weather Reports

[calvinkaskey]

I chased a severe storm through three small hamlets. A tree covered 3/4th of a major road, a small tree down on a side road in the next hamlet over along with large branches down in several yards with possible damage and the next hamlet over two trees down on one house with visual damage (also on a major road) along with the possibility of wood from a structure in the road. There were no severe reports in the immediate areas. est. 65 mph winds FYI

 

[rdale]

I'm not sure what this post is about?

 

[calvinkaskey]

Well I didn't report it to the NWS after they dissed my funnel clouds as a bunch of scud or not clear enough even when I pointed to the area in the video and the time in the video and there were no dots on the map or official damage from t-storm winds from the trees being down and damaging structures.

 

[rdale]

They can't put info on the map if nobody reports it. Holding back on severe weather information because they didn't agree with your interpretation in the past is a little bit... Well... I think we know...

 

[Skip Talbot]

Well I didn't report it to the NWS after they dissed my funnel clouds as a bunch of scud...

A couple of comment on this, and hopefully our responses to your posts and the NWS's don't discourage you from spotting and chasing. The majority of funnel cloud reports are false. There's a number of reasons why. The biggest: Spotters are overly eager to identify severe weather and save their town, and thus start seeing funnels in every pointy, turbulent, rising or swirling fragment of cloud. Second, pointy clouds and scud are extremely common, but funnels that pose a threat of being associated with tornadoes are pretty rare.

I think it's important to talk about your feelings that the NWS "dissed" your report, especially since this mentality seems to be common with spotters and even chasers of many years on this forum. Severe weather reports should be scrutinized, verified, and their sources should be reputable since they are factored into warning decisions. If the majority of funnel clouds reports are false, the NWS should be skeptical when they receive them don't you think? 75% of tornado warnings are already false alarms. How many more false alarms would we have if the NWS pulled the trigger on a tornado warning every time an overly ambitious spotter reported scud as a funnel? Questioning or challenging a severe weather report is not "dissing" it. If you take it as a personal insult that your severe weather reports aren't being accepted, you are probably spotting for the wrong reasons. Spotters volunteer to provide the most accurate information they can to the NWS, not to boost their pride and egos.

 

[Bob Schafer]

I assume, Calvin, that you're talking about SPC reports. There is a long and storied history of legitimate events not showing up there. As one example, I once filmed a tornado for a solid 5 minutes. I was the only chaser to have seen it. I then showed the video to the guys at a nearby NWS Forecast Office the next day. The reaction I got was "Wow, that's some tornado!!", but it never materialized on the SPC page.

Moral of the story: Forget about it. It may have been a big event in your life, but on a grander-scheme-of-things scale it matters little, and it happens all the time. I don't blame the SPC guys, either. Quite frankly, they have better things to do with their time than to nit-pick the reports.

 

[Mike Smith]

I have had the same issue. Two tornadoes in May, 2012, complete with still photos and video (showing clear rotation and swirling debris) yet never got into LSR's. So, sent directly to SPC. Nothing. I suspect the reason is because there wasn't a warning in effect for either tornado and they didn't want to screw up their verification.

 

[Rob H]

I have had the same issue. Two tornadoes in May, 2012, complete with still photos and video (showing clear rotation and swirling debris) yet never got into LSR's. So, sent directly to SPC. Nothing. I suspect the reason is because there wasn't a warning in effect for either tornado and they didn't want to screw up their verification.

I didn't think SPC handled LSRs - they just collected them from the various WFOs and make a pretty graphic out of it. SPC also doesn't issue warnings and probably doesn't care if an individual WFO has crappy verification stats.

Back to the original topic:
We have to remember that the NWS isn't some infallible behemoth - it's staffed by humans just like you and I. OUN has become somewhat notorious for not including LSRs or doing damage surveys, but I can kind of understand. Why survey that tiny rope that knocked over a few powerlines when a few days later an EF-5 rips up a populated area? On the flip side, the people at MPX have gone out of their way to verify an EF-0 I saw that damaged maybe $10 worth of crops in a field, but nothing much else was going on at the time.

 

[Jeff Snyder]

Regarding reports that don't show up on the SPC website...

Did they make it into Storm Data? The reports on the SPC site are preliminary and are compiled from LSRs issued by individual NWSFOs (not the SPC).. I know some offices aren't too hot on releasing a bunch of LSRs when the reports come in after the event. However, such events tend to wind up in Storm Data, which, AFAIK, is the "official" place for reports anyway. I'd keep knocking on the NWSFO responsible for the location you're in by eSpotter, SpotterNetwork, and/or any other means by which you can submit a report (granted, don't spam them with reports!).

 

[calvinkaskey]

I checked and it was no. Because of it I didn't bother reporting 3 other severe wind reports. Because of inaccurate reporting a large outbreak might not even be reported as such in some areas. 9/11/13 was probably the most extensive severe outbreak in the entire southern tier of New York for the year but if 3 hamlets 10 miles apart with a tree on a major artery ie. Binghamton (county population 200k) to a major town/city like Ithaca (Cornell University, Ithaca College) and two trees on a house along with other damage is not reported at all the whole reporting system is in doubt.

 

[Shawn Schuman]

I checked and it was no. Because of it I didn't bother reporting 3 other severe wind reports. Because of inaccurate reporting a large outbreak might not even be reported as such in some areas. 9/11/13 was probably the most extensive severe outbreak in the entire southern tier of New York for the year but if 3 hamlets 10 miles apart with a tree on a major artery ie. Binghamton (county population 200k) to a major town/city like Ithaca (Cornell University, Ithaca College) and two trees on a house along with other damage is not reported at all the whole reporting system is in doubt.

So your solution to this problem is to further hamper the accuracy by withholding additional reports? Come on man. Skip already made an excellent post so I won't repeat his points, but I really think you'd do well to reread it. Maybe your funnel cloud report really was accurate, but just because your NWSFO disagreed does not mean they "dissed" you. I've had reports not show up before, but I'm not going to take it personally and feel slighted because of it. I've also had a legitimate funnel cloud report that they disagreed with. The NWS is populated by people, and people are sometimes prone to mistakes. Such is life. I'm sure many of us have had similar experiences at some point or another. It's reasonable to make your case if you're confident that you're right, or to remind them if you feel something is incorrect, but if you're going to take things personally like this then perhaps you shouldn't be spotting.

Incidentally, I'm in the BGM area as well.

 

[John Wetter]

Wow... This post is just sad... And as Jeff mentioned, just because it didn't get LSR'ed doesn't mean it wasn't recorded. Is it in Storm Data? That's the definitive source. LSR's are all preliminary information. A lot of work is done between an LSR and storm data being finalized.

To withhold information though because you feel you got 'dissed' shows a huge lack of maturity though which is something you need to think about. Be involved in the process or don't, but don't just sit and sort of be involved and complain at the same time.

 

[Joey Ketcham]

This cannot be a serious thread. As I read the OP's posts on here, I can't help but feel as though it's being written by a very young teenager. Poorly constructed paragraphs that make little to no sense what-so-ever and being butt hurt over a report being dismissed so he goes pouting in the corner and refuses to report future observations. I'm sensing that we're being trolled.

 

[Jason Boggs]

What Joey said-----------------^^^^^^

 

[calvinkaskey]

I just didn't bother to report it. Honestly I thought damage and disruption would have been reported. It might have been several days after I looked at the reports. My point is, what is the NWS doing to make sure that major events are recorded?