Heavy to excessive rainfall may bring flooding to parts of Arizona, New Mexico, Florida, North Carolina, and Virginia today. Recently burned areas will be particularly vulnerable to flash flooding. Gusty winds and low humidity will bring elevated to critical fire weather conditions to parts of the Northwest U.S. and central Alaska today. Read More >
No Specialized Experience is Needed - Everyone is Welcome!!
The National Weather Service Office in North Platte, Nebraska, will provide both in person and virtual spotter training once again this Spring of 2023. Please see the schedule below for our latest spotter training opportunities. All interested spotters are welcome to attend any one of our spotter talks. This training is absolutely open to the public. If you have further questions, please contact the Warning Coordination Meteorologist Shawn Jacobs directly.
The National Weather Service Forecast Office in North Platte, in coordination with county emergency managers, volunteer fire departments and other local community organizations offer storm spotter classes at several locations to prepare for severe weather season. If you would like to assist your local community by becoming a volunteer storm spotter and reporting severe weather to the National Weather Service, or if you simply want to learn more about severe weather, consider attending one of our virtual classes. Classes are approximately 1 to 1.5 hours.
Attendees are taught the basics of thunderstorm development, storm structure, the features to look for, and where to find them. What, when and how to report information as well as basic severe weather safety are also covered.
We will also provide an Advanced Spotter Course this year where we will dig deeper into forecasting of a highly impactful severe "wind" event. We will put you in the "hot seat" as a warning forecaster and test your understanding of the storm spotter process. You do not need to attend the advanced training to be certified as a storm spotter.
Photo Courtesy: Michael Charnick - Frontier County (May 2019)
If you have any questions about a class date or location, please call the contact information provided, or visit with your local county emergency manager for scheduling the training. The training is free and may require pre-registration if noted on the date of training. If you have additional questions, email Warning Coordination Meteorologist Shawn Jacobs.
Additional learning opportunities include:
The schedule of classes is listed below. One need only attend a single class of each type, but you must attend a Basic course prior to an Advanced course.
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