Atmospheric River in the Pacific Northwest and Northern Rockies this Weekend

A Pacific storm and atmospheric river will impact the Pacific Northwest states and northern Rockies this weekend, bringing locally heavy low elevations rain and heavy high elevation snow in the mountains. By Sunday over the Interior Northwest, rain combined with snowmelt will increase the risk of flood hazards. Flood Watches are in effect. Read More >

Overview
Becoming a Spotter
Spotter Resources
Training Schedule
Reporting Guidelines
SKYWARN ™

WEATHER FORECAST OFFICE SALT LAKE CITY, UT WEATHER SPOTTER PROGRAM

The National Weather Service (NWS) in Salt Lake City maintains a volunteer spotter network with over 400 people assisting our office. Members of this spotter network are trained to objectively observe and quantify potentially hazardous weather phenomenon and report their findings to the Salt Lake City Weather Forecast Office. Significant weather events in Utah and southwest Wyoming range from high winds, snow and blizzards, to hail and even tornadoes. The services our spotters provide in reporting these events are invaluable to our office. The Utah and Southwest Wyoming Storm Spotter Page is dedicated to giving our spotters online access to resources such as training guides and presentations, information about upcoming training sessions, our spotter newsletter, and more. Additionally, those who have a vested interest in weather can use this page to contact us, and begin the process of becoming an official storm spotter.

ROLE OF THE WEATHER SPOTTER

A weather spotter is a person who observes significant weather and relays the information to the NWS or appropriate local authority, based on the severity and immediate threat of the event observed.

Spotters provide an invaluable service to their communities and to the NWS. The information they provide helps their community by assisting local public safety officials in making critical decisions aimed at protecting lives and property. During life-threatening weather events such as tornadoes and flash flooding, these real-time reports from weather spotters are used to help warn others in their community, as well as those neighboring communities which may be in harm's way.

Spotter reports also help NWSforecasters in the critical decision making process of determining what storms pose a risk to lives and property. The NWS uses these critical reports from storm spotters in combination with radar, satellite, and automated surface observations when issuing Severe Thunderstorm, Tornado, Flash Flood, Winter Storm, and other types of warnings. Your report becomes part of the warning decision making process, and is combined with radar data and other information and used by NWS forecasters to decide whether or not to:

Issue a new warning
Cancel an existing warning
Continue a warning
Issue a warning for the next county
Change the warning type (from severe thunderstorm to tornado, for example)

In addition to being used in the warning decision making process by NWS forecasters, spotter reports also provide valuable information to people in the path of a potentially deadly storm. Ground truth reports from spotters help to give credibility to the warnings issued by the NWS to those people who are in the path of a potentially damaging or life-threatening storm. This ground-truth information helps motivate people in harms way to take action to protect themselves and their property.

At times, the NWS may call a spotter after a storm has passed, in order to inquire what conditions were like as the storm moved through. This information helps NWS forecasters train for the next big event. Of course, spotters are always encouraged to take the initiative and call the NWS office with their information.

HOW TO BECOME A WEATHER SPOTTER

In order to become an official storm spotter, one must be trained in recognizing different types of weather phenomena when they occur, doing so in a safe manner without putting themselves in danger. Some examples of this include:

The ability to determine the strength and type of a storm based on observations of cloud characteristics
The ability to differentiate a funnel cloud or tornado from clouds which may appear threatening, but in reality are non-threatening look-alikes to these dangerous weather phenomena.
The ability to recognize what types of threats a storm may pose (i.e. lightning, tornadoes, large hail, damaging winds, etc...), and determine what a storm may do in the next 15-30 minutes based on observations of cloud formations within the storm.
A detailed knowledge of his or her local area, and the ability to determine when excessive rainfall is likely to result in flooding within this area.
The ability to accurately measure snow depth and intensity.
A prospective storm spotter can gain this training by attending a 60-90 minute Weather Spotter Training Session presented by a meteorologist from the National Weather Service office in Salt Lake City. These training sessions are offered free of charge to the general public across the area during the late winter and spring months. These sessions are also educational for schoolage children who have an interest in weather. You can view an online version of this presentation here.

IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN BECOMING A WEATHER SPOTTER

Attend a weather spotter training session
View the online spotter training
Download the spotter registration form, and mail it back to the NWS Salt Lake City forecast office
Contact Kevin Barjenbruch, Salt Lake City Warning Coordination Meteorologist (WCM) by calling 801-524-5113, or via email to kevin.barjenbruch@noaa.gov and express your interest in becoming a weather spotter.