The NOAA/NWS Storm Prediction Center's Integrated
Machine-based Predictive Analytics for Convective Threats to Society (IMPACTS)
Statistical Model (288)
Patrick Marsh, NOAA/NWS
Storm Prediction Center, Norman, OK
Robert Clark, University
of Oklahoma Cooperative Institute for Mesoscale Meteorological Studies
Russell Schneider, NOAA/NWS
Storm Prediction Center
Harold Brooks, NOAA/OAR
National Severe Storms Laboratory
Somer Erickson, DHS
Federal Emergency Management Agency
Abstract:
NOAA's Weather-Ready Nation
is about readying communities for extreme weather, water, and climate events.
This effort requires not only accurate and timely forecasts and warnings but
also building the capacity, by working with key public and private partners, to
respond effectively to these high-impact events. The NWS Storm Prediction
Center (SPC) has built a statistical framework, Integrated Machine-based
Predictive Analytics for Convective Threats to Society (IMPACTS), to simulate
potential societal impacts of tornadoes. IMPACTS consists of two separate
components: a weather generator, based upon SPC's Convective Outlooks, that
simulates the number, location, and strength/intensity of potential tornadoes,
and a method of assessing the potential societal impacts from these
simulation(s).
A primary outcome of IMPACTS
is the creation, sharing, and use of transformational datasets that enhance
emergency managers' abilities to recognize the potential, and prepare, for
high-impact tornado events. This presentation will give a brief overview of
IMPACTS and its initial operating capacity. Preliminary results and findings of
IMPACTS' probabilistic forecasts of societal impacts during the traditional
severe weather season of 2018 will be discussed.
IMPACTS will improve our
nation's tornado response capabilities by providing reliable, probabilistic
predictions of potential societal impacts to decision-makers at the local,
regional (FEMA and states), and national (FEMA) level. Additionally, the
methods underlying IMPACTS will serve as the foundation for societal-impact
prediction involving other hazardous weather phenomena at a multitude of
temporal and spatial scales. These methods are therefore uniquely positioned to
capitalize upon NOAA's FACETs initiative.