AWT Takes Over FPAW

Stakeholders from across the aviation community are in Kansas City this week for the Spring FPAW (Friends and Partners of Aviation Weather) meeting. Today, AWT integrated with FPAW to leverage knowledge and thoughts from users and producers of aviation weather information. The primary focus today was evaluating user interpretation of probabilistic aviation information. Through online polling and discussion, users were able to provide insite on aviation probabilistic products.

AWT presents at FPAW

This morning, we started with an overview of the winter weather dashboard; which is an operational product both on aviationweather.gov and experimental on our beta website. FPAW participants appreciated the demonstration of the dashboard and being able to see plume and model trend data. They also expressed interest in more information on the impact thresholds on the dashboard.

After lunch, FPAW broke into groups to discuss non-deterministic methods for communicating aviation hazards. Utilizing some of the probabalistic desk graphics the testbed participants have been working on during the week, we got a lot of feedback on how the data are presented and how different weather phenonemon impact the general aviation community. Some of the "hot topics" from the participants were focused on how detailed the graphics are or should be, spatial coverage of the polygons, and how pilots versus meteorologists perceive data.

AWT Organizer, Jack Lind, leading discussion on probabilistic graphics

The day wrapped up with a look at the outlooks graphics from last years 2022 AWT Summer Experiment. Good discussion on the time scale of the outlooks, the busyness of a map with all aviation weather impacts, and how adding text to the graphic would enhance an outlook helped AWT hone in on some of the things the general aviation community is looking for in an outlook graphic.

2023 AWT Spring Experiment in full swing

The AWT is hosting meteorologists from across the country for our spring experiment! This week, participants from the Meteorological Developement Lab (MDL), Global Systems Lab (GSL), FAA Aviation Weather Demenstration and Evaluation (AWDE), Alaska Aviation Weather Unit (AAWU)/Alaska Region, Honolulu Forecast Office (HFO)/Pacific Region, and various Center Weather Service Units and Forecast Offices are here to help evaluate products and provide their insite and expertise.

Participants diagramming workflows for Hazard Services

There are three areas of focus this year: evaluating the 3-dimensional cloud forecasts from the RRFS, creation and discussion of prototype probabalistic graphics and how to present information to the general aviaiton community, and developing and evaluating workflows for Hazard Services for aviation.

Using various resources to create probabilistic forecasts