"Too Much" Lead Time?

[Greg Blumberg]

I work in the large venue severe weather preparedness area, so lead time is definitely an important factor. As for long lead times in large venue locations, I think the longer you have them, the better off you are considering how long it takes to evacuate or prepare a place i.e. amusement park, sports stadium. Problem is, large venues don't make up all of the recipients of warnings.

The problem is that your lead time is somewhat directly related to the amount of people you are trying to prepare per location in a warning scenario. I'm not sure if this can be fixed. Furthermore, I don't think that watches and warnings are fully understood because there's not definition of time context or numbers usually attached to them, mostly because portions of the warning process are subjective. I haven't ever seen a timeline perspective for when we are in a severe weather environment published in weather preparedness literature. Most literature will tell you "This is what a watch means. This is what a warning means. If there's a warning you do this. If there's a watch you do this." It's a finite form of informing people. (Try saying that 5 times fast.)

I haven't really seen preparedness literature that puts preparedness into the context of a human's awareness. The thing that we need to have the public capture is awareness. I'm not thinking of just weather awareness, but awareness of the forecasting process that occurs as time goes on. The public needs to be told what to expect from both the weather and weather sources. What products could be issued today that will affect me? For example, "Western Oklahoma has a threat for severe weather today as mentioned by TV meteorologists. Folks need to be aware that a tornado watch may be issued for this area signifying this threat. Additionally, you can expect severe thunderstorm warnings and tornado warnings throughout the day." These forecasts for severe weather products can easily go hand in hand with the actual forecast. I'm not a big fan of the just-in-time preparedness I see in some plans.

I think in order to enhance watch/warning effectiveness, you have to have awareness in potential watch and warnings for that day. That way the public knows what to expect. Furthermore, I believe that preparedness literature needs to take the reader through their own "tabletop" exercise and hence personalize the threat. I usually see the line "make a plan" quite often in preparedness literature, but rarely is that part ever fully elaborated on. A weather preparedness plan (in large venues and homes) is so wide and variable examples must be provided. If possible, I think literature should integrate the "make a plan" suggestion with a story that involves the evolution of National Weather Service products and people's expected reactions. In my experience (and I'm sure the same is for many people on this forum) is that entertainment can easily go hand-in-hand good learning.

To summarize, the reception of information needs to be personalized by demonstrating the weather products and events one can expect during a severe weather scenario.

Also, this makes me think of the warn-on-forecast program and how that'll be integrated into this dilemma effectively.

 

[Greg Stumpf]

I've said this a number of times before on this forum and others. Increasing lead times *must* be accompanied by a change in the information content to include site-specific expected times of arrival and departure (TOA and TOD) of the hazard. Then the lead times could be as long as anyone wants/needs.

Also, most of the posters in this thread are thinking that warnings only serve the "general public" (however that is defined) in "average" situations (at home) and only require X amount of lead time to take shelter. The NWS must consider the *spectrum* of users and the *spectrum* of their ever changing personal exposures to hazards, and the equation becomes more complex. One lead time and one warning cannot fit all! Hence, the recent attempts to address these challenges with threats-in-motion warnings (equitable lead times) and probabilistic information (greater lead time for users at higher risk to hazard and/or longer reaction times).

And before Mike S. regurgitates his opposition to these concepts yet again, or cites several anecdotal examples of his interaction with members of public who don't want these things, I'll mention that there is some other evidence to show otherwise. One recent study of folks impacted by the 10 May 10 tornadoes in Cleveland County OK show that some survey respondents wanted more detailed information about the tornadoes, including TOA information and graphics depicting the threat similar to the hurricane probabilistic strike cones.

My feelings about what private sector should offer as legitimate services are summed up as follows: 1) offering services to protect the financial assets of a business from weather losses, 2) offering services that add value or repackage government data in a customized way for a paying customer (which includes, BTW, weather radios manufactured by the private sector!), and 3) offering original weather content that a customer deems is worth paying for over similar but free weather content from the government. On that final point, one shouldn't expect that the free government content should remain stagnant - they too are going to strive to improve what they offer. If private sector needs to compete against that, then it is up to them to stay ahead of the curve, which is not always too difficult knowing how slowly government can sometimes move forward.

Also in the discussion above I read too much of "the current warning delivery methods wouldn't be able to offer such services" (e.g. can't use weather radio for point-specific TOA information). We make a point in our various workshops when discussing the future of government warning and product services to avoid constraining your discussion by current technology and policy limitations. Those are evolving, or could be made to evolve in response to any proposed new capabilities! For example, there are many areas of "thin" cell phone coverage now, but in the future, probably not.

One final point - let social scientists help determine how users respond to hazards, how they understand hazards, and what users need to do to mitigate the hazards.

 

[Tim Stoecklein]

...including TOA information and graphics depicting the threat similar to the hurricane probabilistic strike cones.

I appreciate all the insight Greg, but I'm especially glad you pointed out the TOA and strike cones. I think one of the simplest and to-the-point graphics we see on a lot of media wx coverage these days focus on these two items. I really think it's been one of the most effective tools for TV mets to set the public to action in taking shelter.

 

[Keith Hosman]

Explain to me your specific job when severe weather rolls into your area. Is it specifically to set off sirens? I want to formulate a response and have one, but I want to have all my facts straight and find out what goes on in Emergency Management and your situation. *Genuinely interested, no flames intended lol*

In our county, the sirens are set off by the 911 dispatch, The city of Napoleon has their own dispatch and the Sheriff's Dept takes care of the county. Two of the sirens in the county however do not have remote tone capability, someone has to physically drive to the site and flip a switch to activate the sirens. As far as the decision to set off the sirens, we set themn off when the NWS issues a warning, or when a spotter in the county see's something that we determine to be cause for activating the sirens. My participation in this regard is that when a spotter reports seeing something visually w/o a warning from the NWS, is that I'm sitting here at the EOC watching the radar, and if I do not see anything on radar that matches what the spotter is reporting I typically make the call to not activate the sirens.

We (the EMA) write/maintain the county EOP (Emergency Operations Plan) that dictates how the response agencies will respond to situations that arise in the county. One of the sections of the EOP is notification and warning. This is one of the areas where the use of the warning sirens is discussed. We set the policy for the county, and as it is signed by the board of commissioners it is a binding legal document. This is where our concern lies. We are obligated to act in a way that follows what the EOP says.

I am all for advanced warning/lead time. Our (the EMA) responsibility is public safety and property protection, and the sooner we can warn people and they can take steps to protect themselves the better. We have had however situations in the past where there was a tornado in the county and people just went about their business as if nothing was going on. November 2002 the tornado that hit Van Wert dissipated 6 miles from Napoleon just outside of Malinta Ohio, it did damage in our county, derailing a train in the southern part of the county and moved two houses off of their foundations breaking the gas lines. The sirens had sounded, and yet people were walking around downtown like nothing was going on. I saw this with my own eyes as I headed to the office.

My day typically starts out the same way, I come in to the office, first thing I do is look at the weather forecast, if there is a HWO I read it, and check the SPC site as well. Depending on what it says I start making plans accordingly. I have am email list that I use to contact our spotters to let them know we may need to activate them later that day. As the day progresses I update them with further information. I watch the counties to out west and southwest, when the counties in Indiana on the Ohio Indiana line are under warnings I notify the spotters so they can get into place if they spot from the field, we have many that stay at their homes and spot from there. We also utilize our county fire departments as spotters. I like the get them into place with enough time to get settled. Sending spotters out when a warning for our county is too late with the speed the storms travel through here typically. The decision to activate the fire departments to go spot is made here at the EOC.


Does this help answer your questions?

 

[Mike Smith]

And before Mike S. regurgitates his opposition to these concepts yet again, or cites several anecdotal examples of his interaction with members of public who don't want these things, I'll mention that there is some other evidence to show otherwise. One recent study of folks impacted by the 10 May 10 tornadoes in Cleveland County OK show that some survey respondents wanted more detailed information about the tornadoes, including TOA information and graphics depicting the threat similar to the hurricane probabilistic strike cones. On that final point, one shouldn't expect that the free government content should remain stagnant - they too are going to strive to improve what they offer. If private sector needs to compete against that, then it is up to them to stay ahead of the curve, which is not always too difficult knowing how slowly government can sometimes move forward.

Nothing like an unprovoked attack, Greg.

No one, least of all me, expects the government to remain stagnant. If you would take a moment to research Storm Track (i.e., http://www.stormtrack.org/forum/showthread.php?2143-OKC-area-Tornadoes-on-Storm-Hawk-and-SelectWarn ) or my papers (i.e., http://weatherdata.com/services/news_falsealarms.pdf ) you would see that I was cheering on polygon warnings which were a major improvement in NWS warnings. I suggest you read "Warnings" if you don't think I celebrate the successes of the NWS. I will be in TUL Wednesday giving a speech (invited local NWS as my guests) where I will be presenting Miracle at Greensburg which celebrates the NWS work at saving lives that night.

I will cheer on improvements in NWS CSI (whether they come from lower FAR, higher PoD, or both) and will be happy to acknowledge the improvements just as I have done in the past.

Just because I question all of the recent focus on "lead time" does not, in any way, make me an opponent of the NWS.

Finally, how about citing this survey that you indicate supports your case so the entire community can benefit from it?

Mike

 

[Greg Stumpf]

Nothing like an unprovoked attack, Greg.

...deletia...

Finally, how about citing this survey that you indicate supports your case so the entire community can benefit from it?

Not an attack, just a "preemptive rebuttal"! I never doubted your acknowledgment of NWS improvements (your book makes this clear). Instead, your stated opposition to some of the warning improvements we have touted via the Hazardous Weather Testbed are rooted in your belief that these kinds of improvements are not needed, are not desired, or will not work - you've made that very clear in previous posts. I happen to disagree with that conclusion, and also believe that the jury is still out awaiting social science analysis.

For the record, I won't cheer on improvements to CSI, because 1) it doesn't (in *my* opinion) properly measure improvements in service, and 2) it is being calculated incorrectly (merging POD and FAR calculated using two different contingency tables). I am currently addressing this in a study which you should hear about sometime later this year.

Finally, here's the citation you asked for:

http://www.caps.ou.edu/reu/reu10/papers/Stalker.pdf
http://ams.confex.com/ams/91Annual/webprogram/Paper183539.html

 

[Danny Neal]

In our county, the sirens are set off by the 911 dispatch, The city of Napoleon has their own dispatch and the Sheriff's Dept takes care of the county. Two of the sirens in the county however do not have remote tone capability, someone has to physically drive to the site and flip a switch to activate the sirens. As far as the decision to set off the sirens, we set themn off when the NWS issues a warning, or when a spotter in the county see's something that we determine to be cause for activating the sirens. My participation in this regard is that when a spotter reports seeing something visually w/o a warning from the NWS, is that I'm sitting here at the EOC watching the radar, and if I do not see anything on radar that matches what the spotter is reporting I typically make the call to not activate the sirens.

We (the EMA) write/maintain the county EOP (Emergency Operations Plan) that dictates how the response agencies will respond to situations that arise in the county. One of the sections of the EOP is notification and warning. This is one of the areas where the use of the warning sirens is discussed. We set the policy for the county, and as it is signed by the board of commissioners it is a binding legal document. This is where our concern lies. We are obligated to act in a way that follows what the EOP says.

I am all for advanced warning/lead time. Our (the EMA) responsibility is public safety and property protection, and the sooner we can warn people and they can take steps to protect themselves the better. We have had however situations in the past where there was a tornado in the county and people just went about their business as if nothing was going on. November 2002 the tornado that hit Van Wert dissipated 6 miles from Napoleon just outside of Malinta Ohio, it did damage in our county, derailing a train in the southern part of the county and moved two houses off of their foundations breaking the gas lines. The sirens had sounded, and yet people were walking around downtown like nothing was going on. I saw this with my own eyes as I headed to the office.

My day typically starts out the same way, I come in to the office, first thing I do is look at the weather forecast, if there is a HWO I read it, and check the SPC site as well. Depending on what it says I start making plans accordingly. I have am email list that I use to contact our spotters to let them know we may need to activate them later that day. As the day progresses I update them with further information. I watch the counties to out west and southwest, when the counties in Indiana on the Ohio Indiana line are under warnings I notify the spotters so they can get into place if they spot from the field, we have many that stay at their homes and spot from there. We also utilize our county fire departments as spotters. I like the get them into place with enough time to get settled. Sending spotters out when a warning for our county is too late with the speed the storms travel through here typically. The decision to activate the fire departments to go spot is made here at the EOC.


Does this help answer your questions?

Very good. Thank you for the reply. It is always fascinating for me to hear how different areas in the country work to accomplish one goal (warning the public). Now, would it be possible that your job would be made easier with the future implication of WoF? Do you think that after all of that the public still needs more than 20 minutes? If you think about it.... the EOC is doing all the behind the scenes work already, WoF would seem to make your job 100 times easier. *By you I mean the whole EMA in general* If you can set a threshold of 70% chance of seeing a tornado in the next 45 minutes, you can also assemble the personnel needed once those %'s reach 25-40%. You don't necessarily have to wait for warnings further down the line or for your own county. Sure the public won't know any better, but the ones whose job is to protect them will have their resources all assembled by the time you would normally push the button.
-----

As Rob has pointed out, there is no proof that the public has been desensitized by "crying wolf", but it is hard to ignore the fact that many people ignore sirens. You stated so yourself, I have stated it, just about anyone that has chased before and been through a town when the sirens are blaring have seen it. An example of this was the Bowdle tornado... people were on main street looking to the SSW for the tornado probably thinking "just another false alarm" when a mammoth ef-4 was one mile to their NW. Skip Talbot has a picture of this I believe, maybe he will post it. The NWS did everything they could, spotters/chasers provided real time reports and warnings, the sirens were sounded for 30 minutes, yet people still chose to stand out in the street and "see it to believe it". Unfortunately all the lead time in the world won't dose human curiosity(stupidity). I think if we can get where we only sound the sirens within a 15-20 minute threshold of when a tornado is likely to hit and show some accuracy doing so will people finally put two and two together that the sirens aren't a signal to come outside and gawk at all the cars with antennas on them passing through their neighborhood. Even then, you still will get your stubborn ones. As I have stated above.... with WoF the ball will get rolling much quicker with larger venues, hospitals, etc they will have had warning something is coming for up to an hour.... I would imagine you would want them to get the word much quicker than Joe 25 year old who is sitting watching t.v. with the skies still clear.
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Rural areas are trickier.... usually you set off a siren for 10 to 20 people (that is if they even hear it). In my mind the question becomes, how much lead time vs how do they get the warnings? Odds are nobody is going to hear the sirens if they are indoors or at night if the siren is 5 miles away. I hate to say it but with shorter lead times it sort of forces the end user to act and make the decision. They won't have 30-45 minutes to sit there and wait and wait and wait because the next warning comes around they'll be like... "I missed the end of Dancing with the Stars because I sat downstairs for 45 minutes" Give them their 10-20 minutes to decide whether they want to live or take the chance at playing Russian Roulette with Mother Nature.

 

[Keith Hosman]

Very good. Thank you for the reply. It is always fascinating for me to hear how different areas in the country work to accomplish one goal (warning the public). Now, would it be possible that your job would be made easier with the future implication of WoF? Do you think that after all of that the public still needs more than 20 minutes? If you think about it.... the EOC is doing all the behind the scenes work already, WoF would seem to make your job 100 times easier. *By you I mean the whole EMA in general* If you can set a threshold of 70% chance of seeing a tornado in the next 45 minutes, you can also assemble the personnel needed once those %'s reach 25-40%. You don't necessarily have to wait for warnings further down the line or for your own county. Sure the public won't know any better, but the ones whose job is to protect them will have their resources all assembled by the time you would normally push the button.
-----

As Rob has pointed out, there is no proof that the public has been desensitized by "crying wolf", but it is hard to ignore the fact that many people ignore sirens. You stated so yourself, I have stated it, just about anyone that has chased before and been through a town when the sirens are blaring have seen it. An example of this was the Bowdle tornado... people were on main street looking to the SSW for the tornado probably thinking "just another false alarm" when a mammoth ef-4 was one mile to their NW. Skip Talbot has a picture of this I believe, maybe he will post it. The NWS did everything they could, spotters/chasers provided real time reports and warnings, the sirens were sounded for 30 minutes, yet people still chose to stand out in the street and "see it to believe it". Unfortunately all the lead time in the world won't dose human curiosity(stupidity). I think if we can get where we only sound the sirens within a 15-20 minute threshold of when a tornado is likely to hit and show some accuracy doing so will people finally put two and two together that the sirens aren't a signal to come outside and gawk at all the cars with antennas on them passing through their neighborhood. Even then, you still will get your stubborn ones. As I have stated above.... with WoF the ball will get rolling much quicker with larger venues, hospitals, etc they will have had warning something is coming for up to an hour.... I would imagine you would want them to get the word much quicker than Joe 25 year old who is sitting watching t.v. with the skies still clear.
--------

Rural areas are trickier.... usually you set off a siren for 10 to 20 people (that is if they even hear it). In my mind the question becomes, how much lead time vs how do they get the warnings? Odds are nobody is going to hear the sirens if they are indoors or at night if the siren is 5 miles away. I hate to say it but with shorter lead times it sort of forces the end user to act and make the decision. They won't have 30-45 minutes to sit there and wait and wait and wait because the next warning comes around they'll be like... "I missed the end of Dancing with the Stars because I sat downstairs for 45 minutes" Give them their 10-20 minutes to decide whether they want to live or take the chance at playing Russian Roulette with Mother Nature.

I am not sure what you mean by WoF so I don't know how to reply to that heh. Last Spring when we had the tornados that hit in Fulton and Wood counties, it was a bit confusing, because warnings were issued, then a seond warning was issued for the same area for a longer duration. When the first warnings were expired, some of the public were under the impression that ALL warnings had expired. Now here I am not sure how to fix this problem. When the tornado hit Fulton County, it actually touched down initially in my county just south of the county line just to the west of St Rt 109, crossing the intersection of the countyline and St Rt 109 destroying a personal friend's (former paramedic who's son attended the Skywarn training we hosted here last spring) house before moving to the N.E. crossing the S.E corner of Fulton County into the westen edge of Lucas County. In that area there is a large woods that is part of a state park and state forest. The sirens in that area were practially useless due to the woods that muffled the sound.

In our county, the sirens for the most part are set up in the towns/villiages in the county and while in town can be clearly heard, but as you move out of town the sirens become less audible. This is one reason why I have a concern about the whole notification/warning issue. Granted people watching tv or listening to radios can be alerted by EAS, but if they lose power their TV and radio (unless it has battery power as well) is useless. The best option would be for everyone to have a NOAA/All Hazard radio with battery backup. Many people in the county have scanners, heh small area where everyone knows everyone and they are all nosey and interested in what's going on. This is one reason why we make announcements over the public service frequencies (law enforcement and fire frequencies) when severe weather is possible, imminent, or occouring. The public safety people are the first ones to respond, so they need to be made aware of what is possible or what is happening.

I will say that I do like the new polygon warnings vs. the old countywide warnings. It used to be if a storm was going through the N.W. corner of the county and only effected that part of the county, the whole county was warned and all sirens sounded when there was blue sky in the S.E. corner. This makes the decision making much easier.

 

[Mike Smith]

Greg,

Thanks for the response, but I don't think your criticism of my "anecdotes" holds up when the survey you cite interviewed a grand total of six people. By coincidence, that is exactly the number of responses (3 on the STL P-D web site, 1 on KMOV TV web site, and two different radio hosts commenting to me = 6) that formed the basis for starting this thread. Neither is a scientifically valid sample and that is not what I was getting at.

I wasn't attempting to comment on WoF. My purpose in starting this thread was to get people's thoughts on whether there might be too much lead time with the current warning system. The answer may be "yes" but I don't think we know for sure.

Mike

 

[Greg Stumpf]

Thanks for the response, but I don't think your criticism of my "anecdotes" holds up when the survey you cite interviewed a grand total of six people. By coincidence, that is exactly the number of responses (3 on the STL P-D web site, 1 on KMOV TV web site, and two different radio hosts commenting to me = 6) that formed the basis for starting this thread. Neither is a scientifically valid sample and that is not what I was getting at.

Agreed, and hopefully we can agree that we can't make generalizations based on these small samples. But they illustrate a point I frequently make, that the users of the data are represented as a spectrum, and we in the HWT try to address future systems that can address the spectrum, and not an "average user" or heaven-forbid, a "lowest-common denominator".

I wasn't attempting to comment on WoF. My purpose in starting this thread was to get people's thoughts on whether there might be too much lead time with the current warning system. The answer may be "yes" but I don't think we know for sure.

If given today's state of official warning products represented as ASCII text files, polygons that may or may not represent the swath of the expected hazard over the duration of the warning, and lack of point-specific TOA and TOD information, you are probably right. We can't just necessarily "increase lead time" in today's warning system - we need to evolve the system, the point I was trying to make in the first place.

 

[John Farley]

Since this thread started with questions about the lead time in the St. Louis area for the 12/31 tornado warnings, let me share some insights specifically related to the STL area.

First and most important, I think Governor Nixon is right in saying that this is a case where the warning system worked well and saved lives. The bottom line is that an EF3 tornado went through a densely-populated area and leveled buildings (at least one office building and a number of homes), but nobody died. Additionally, another tornado made a 2.1 mile track through the city of St. Louis, and again, nobody died. There were not even any serious injuries - just a handful of cuts and bruises. So in terms of the result, the warning system did exactly what it was designed to do.

Second, I watched this entire system and the warnings issued for it as it moved into the area, both by TV and internet. Also experienced what happened with the sirens and warning alarm on the WX radio in my specific location in the northeast part of the metro area. My impression is that the NWS was quite careful not to extend the warning polygons more than about 30 (maybe in some cases 40, but in most cases less than that) minutes ahead of the threat. In Edwardsville (and this is contrary to what has happened in several other recent cases) the sirens were not sounded until the city was in a warning polygon, about 25-30 minutes ahead of the storm. So my sense is that the warning times were about right. Now, in advance of the warnings, anyone with access to either local TV stations or TWC would have known that dangerous and potentially tornadic storms were moving toward the metro area - the approach of the storms toward the metro area was well-covered by the local media. But the actual warning issuances were not more than a half hour or a little more ahead of the storm.

Now, in some cases, I think that things happened that caused people to think they were in warnings before they actually were. Some areas, for example, sound the sirens when areas to their west or southwest have tornado warnings. This may have led people to think that they were under warnings before they were. Additionally, from my experience with my S.A.M.E. weather radio, the alarm went off for any warning that was valid anywhere in my county. There were 3 of those (one after the storm had passed Edwardsville and we were under no threat), and the radio alarmed each time - but only in the case of the middle warning was Edwardsville in the warning polygon. So I think that in some cases, either early sounding of sirens or county-wide alarming by S.A.M.E. weather radios may have caused people to think they were under warnings before they were. This would be consistent with some of what Mike posted in his initial post. But in terms of the actual warning polygons and when they were issued, I think the lead time was about right and the NWS was fairly careful not to warn too far ahead of the threat.

 

[Jeff Duda]

Do I think the current system gives too much lead time? Absolutely not. There can never be too much lead time for something as significant as a natural disaster - a tornado. Do I think the wording of, and policy regarding, issuing tornado warnings (because I haven't heard anyone mention any other disasters such as severe thunderstorms, flash floods, or hurricanes for example) could use some improvement? Absolutely yes.

Regardless, what people choose to do with the information they're given is their own business. If they choose to ignore sirens when an actual tornado looms because the sirens have sounded numerous times in the past with no actual threat materializing, then they'll have to deal with the consequences of ignoring the warning. It's not the job of the NWS or the local Emergency Management Office to make sure people are actually getting to shelter (because there are too many people with a multitude of needs and agendas to have time to cater to them all), it's their job to get them the warning.

 

[Mike Johnston]

"I haven't really seen preparedness literature that puts preparedness into the context of a human's awareness. The thing that we need to have the public capture is awareness. I'm not thinking of just weather awareness, but awareness of the forecasting process that occurs as time goes on. The public needs to be told what to expect from both the weather and weather sources. What products could be issued today that will affect me? For example, "Western Oklahoma has a threat for severe weather today as mentioned by TV meteorologists. Folks need to be aware that a tornado watch may be issued for this area signifying this threat. Additionally, you can expect severe thunderstorm warnings and tornado warnings throughout the day." These forecasts for severe weather products can easily go hand in hand with the actual forecast. I'm not a big fan of the just-in-time preparedness I see in some plans."

Isn't the purpose of the Public Severe Weather Outlook issued by the SPC to do exactly this - ie. raise awareness for the day in areas where subsequent watches and warnings are probable? I'm not sure if the lack of a product is the issue, but in the way it is or is not communicated by media outlets, etc.?

 

[rdale]

Isn't the purpose of the Public Severe Weather Outlook issued by the SPC to do exactly this - ie. raise awareness for the day in areas where subsequent watches and warnings are probable?

Not really, the public doesn't give a hoot about the PWO. And local mets are usually able to see a big outbreak possibility with or without the PWO.

 

[Patrick Marsh]

Although the PWO has the word "Public" in the title, in practice, it's mainly used by weather enthusiasts and emergency management types.