Skywarn - Anne Arundel County, MD

William E. Smith, AB3BZ, Coordinator

Introduction

The purpose of Anne Arundel County Skywarn Subnet is to feed information on weather conditions to The National Weather Service Office in Sterling, VA. Skywarn observers provide "ground-truth" and supplement the data received from Doppler radar and other tools.

The main Skywarn net will be activated (Bluemont, VA, 2-meter repeater, 147.300+) when severe weather is in the Baltimore-Washington forecast area. The county subnet will be activated only when severe weather is occurring in, or is approaching, Anne Arundel County, so as not to unnecessarily tie up the local repeaters. The subnet will be activated at the request of The National Weather Service, the Northeast Maryland net manager, or by the county coordinator when severe weather is actually present.

The role of Skywarn is not to provide forecast products to other amateur operators or the general public. There are better channels of communication to provide that information.

Procedures

The Davidsonville 2-meter repeater (147.105+) of The Anne Arundel Radio Club has been designated as the primary repeater, with the north county machine, located near Glen Burnie, (147.075+) as the back-up.

When the net is activated, the net control operator will establish another station as an alternate net control. The net criteria will then be announced and check-ins will be logged. All operators will be accepted even if they are untrained and/or unregistered Skywarn observers. The National Weather Service values all observations. Observations are then recorded. The net will be handed off to the alternate net control while the primary reports to The National Weather Service. The alternate will take observations and then report, etc.

Reports to The National Weather Service Office in Sterling, VA, are made directly to the Bluemont repeater or by telephone.

Weather conditions should be monitored by net control using either TV or the internet. Once severe weather has moved out of the county, the subnet will be closed. If a watch or warning is still in effect for the county, it will be announced that the net may come up again if conditions warrant.

If there is a concurrent ARES or RACES net, the Skywarn net control will check into that net to make a request for weather, as long as the net is not handling emergency/priority traffic at the time. This will be done as briefly as possible so as not to interfere with emergency net operations.

Observers should not proceed to locations where severe weather is occurring to collect data, nor should they be encouraged to do so.

Weather Reports

Observers should give their Skywarn ID (if assigned), and location (this includes city AND state, nearest town, road or intersection). Landmarks should not be used as a method of location. Major highways are acceptable. Observers should not check-in if they have nothing to report.

During the summer months, The National Weather Service is interested in the following weather phenomena:

$ Tornadoes, funnel clouds or rotating wall clouds.

$ Hail (size in terms of U.S. coins: e.g., dime size, quarter size, etc.)

$ Wind gusts in excess of 50 m.p.h.

$ Flooding of streams, creeks or rivers.

$ Roads or streets that are made impassable due weather conditions

$ Rainfall in excess of 1 inch/hour as measured in an approved rain gage

$ Any damage caused by wind or lightning

$ Downed trees, large branches or power lines

In the winter months, they include the above conditions and:

$ Wind gusts in excess of 35 m.p.h.

$ Snow accumulation in inches

$ Any ice accumulation on trees, streets or power lines

$ Sleet or freezing rain

Any licensed amateur radio operator, with a knowledge of general net operations and Skywarn, may volunteer for net control. Any licensed amateur may check into the net to give their weather reports. It is not necessary to be a trained Skywarn observer to check into the net. Please contact William Smith, AB3BZ (bill.ab3bz@verizon.net) if you would like to participate.