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Austin/San Antonio Office Tour and Guest Speaker Information

Photo of the National Weather Service Austin/San Antonio Weather Forecast Office

View of the office in New Braunfels, TX

The National Weather Service (NWS) Forecast Office in New Braunfels, Texas offers guest speakers and office tours to adults and school children.

The NWS Forecast Office in New Braunfels is a small facility, so tour groups of more than 15 people are discouraged and cannot be handled without significant coordination.  In the cases of large groups, we suggest contacting our office to arrange for a speaker to come to your location or meeting place.  We can provide any length of presentation talking about a wide variety of weather topics including severe weather, Skywarn, tornadoes, hurricanes, flooding, weather preparedness, and careers in meteorology.  We provide this service free of charge and would love the opportunity to be a guest speaker at club meetings, schools, civic organizations, etc.  We do ask that you call and request a guest speaker at least a month in advance so scheduling can be arranged.

For a school tour of our office, or for a meteorologist to come and present to a class or grade level, the school kids must have already studied lessons in weather or are currently studying weather.  Elementary groups are discouraged from coming and touring the Weather Service Office as the operations area is not "kid friendly."  Some exceptions could include scout troops when applying for weather and safety badges.   Instead we encourage the school to contact us and set up a time for a meteorologist to come visit the class on the school campus.  The National Weather Service would be happy to participate in career days and career fairs in order to encourage the students to study science.  We usually bring several "hands on" weather items such as a weather balloon, tornado chamber, and can even present the kids with cloud charts and lightning stickers.   There is no fee for this service and no age or grade limit on having a meteorologist come out and speak at the school.   Weather study is a prerequisite and requests need to be made at least a month in advance.  Due to staffing and scheduling, we regret that we will not be able to honor every request.

As with all our outreach efforts, public safety comes first.  Weather and our other job duties will occasionally mean that we may have to cancel the tour or speaking engagement.  We regret any inconvenience this may cause and we can usually give at least 24 hour notice of such a cancellation.  If you are interested in arranging for a guest speaker, school visit, or an office tour, please contact Paul Yura, Warning Coordination Meteorologist, 830-629-0130 ext 223 or send an email to paul.yura@noaa.gov.