Widespread Showers Across the Eastern Half of the US; Severe Thunderstorms in Montana into the Plains
Widespread coverage of showers and thunderstorms across much of the central and eastern U.S., will produce areas of excessive rain in the northwest Gulf Coast, portions of the Mississippi Valley and the southern Mid-Atlantic states. Scattered severe thunderstorms are expected from Montana into portions of the central/southern Plains this weekend.
Read More >
The National Weather Service (NWS) enterprise National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Weather Wire Service (NWWS) provides television and radio broadcasters, emergency managers, commercial / private alerting services, and the general public the fastest receipt of current weather information, alerts and warnings sent in text format from the local NWS Weather Forecast Offices and National Centers.
NWWS has been designed to use both an Internet (NWWS-Open Interface) and a Satellite product source (SBN/NOAAPORT Channel 201). Use of both ingests is highly recommended to achieve a >98% product availability rating. The NWWS is the fastest NWS dissemination method of receiving text formatted alerts and warnings.
Hardware
Satellite Dish 1.8m (may have interference) or larger for better reception 2.4m or greater.
DVB-S2 compatible satellite receiver (NOVRA S300 or similar)
Ethernet, RF coaxial and CAT5 network cables as necessary
Windows - based PC
Minimum - 20GB storage and 3GB RAM
SBN/NOAAPORT Channel 201
Software
XMPP Reader developed by end-user or purchased commercially.
Coding
There is a single XMPP chatroom that has a single user inside the room that is able to talk. This bot user emits a <message> stanza that contains a special payload that has the raw text included. Here is an example message stanza:
So if you are in the chatroom with a client that does not process this special <x> payload, you won’t see all the raw text included in the stanza. The attributes on the <x> stanza are as follows:
The id attribute on the <x> stanza is meant to help clients know if they are missing any products as they parse the stream. The id contains two values loaded up into one and they are separated by a period. The first number is the UNIX process ID on the system running the ingest process. The second number is a simple incremented sequence number for the product.
When users join the chatroom, they are given a 60 message history. These messages may not contain the <x> payload in the situation where the server is restarted.
: AUTOMATED GAUGE DATA COLLECTED FROM IOWA FLOOD CENTER
:
.A CDGI4 20130524 C DH2100/HGIRP 2.63 : MORGAN CREEK NEAR CEDAR RAPIDS
</x>
</message>
cccc
Four character issuing center
ttaaii
The six character WMO product ID
issue
ISO_8601 datetime in UTC
awipsid
The six character AWIPS ID, sometimes called AFOS PIL.
id
This is an unique identifier, see below.
Disclaimer
The United States Government makes no warranty, expressed or implied, as to the usefulness of the software and documentation for any purpose. The U.S. Government, its instrumentalities, officers, employees, and agents assume no responsibility (1) for the use of the software and documentation listed, or (2) to provide technical support to users.
NWS issued User_ID and password required for NWWS-OI. (NWWS-OI Request).
Both credentials are case-sensitive and can only be used on one computer at a time
Multiple use on the same system will create an access error.
No user credentials are needed for NWWS-Satellite PID201.
(See Hardware requirements and configuration for equipment details).
Please note, for NWS Credentials, depending on volume of requests there may be a wait of up to 30+ days depending on active server location.
Due to an update issue, users may experience random disconnects or account authentication errors. Please be patient, these issues eventually self-correct. Some systems may time out attempting to connect; if this happens wait 30-minutes and then attempt to reconnect.
The mission of the National Weather Service is to provide weather, water, and climate data, forecasts, warnings and Impact-based Decision Support Services (IDSS) for the protection of life and property and enhancement of the national economy. NWWS supports this mission with timely dissemination of weather information, alerts, and warnings for use by the public, re-broadcast by the media, and integration into both private and commercial software applications.
History
YEAR
HISTORY OF THE NOAA WEATHER WIRE SERVICE
1849
Weather alerts and information are distributed via telegraph wire.
1890
Weather services transferred from the Signal Service to the newly formed U.S. Weather Bureau under the Department of Agriculture.
1928
Teletype replaces telegraph for weather distribution.
1940
U.S. Weather Bureau transferred to Department of Commerce.
1970
U.S. Weather Bureau renamed National Weather Service (NWS).
1999
NWS develops and implements leased NOAA Weather Wire Service (NWWS) using satellite distribution to States and television and radio broadcasters.
2003
NWWS implements Internet access for all user subscriptions (both public and private).
2015
NWS enterprise architecture NWWS replaces the leased legacy NWWS.
NWWS Description
The NWS enterprise NOAA Weather Wire Service (NWWS) is a combined Internet (Open Interface) and satellite (SBN/NOAAPORT Channel 201) dissemination platform for critical weather information, alerts and warnings to the public in text format.
NWS recommends using both the Internet and satellite ingest to provide the highest product availability to the user.
The NWWS Open Interface (NWWS-OI) requires an NWS issued User_ID and password. The satellite service (NWWS-PID201) does not. PID201 can be received via a 1.8m satellite dish (2m+ is recommended to reduce side-band interference).
NWWS-OI requires an XMPP reader or commercial software to access the message text. Information on configurations and software requirements is available on the NWWS webpage.
NOTE: NWWS-PID201 does not carry the complete offering of NWS products. PID201 only broadcasts NWWS directed text products as issued by the Weather Forecast Offices and National Centers. For a full distribution of NWS products use NWS FTP anonymous (over the Internet) or SBN/NOAAPORT Channels 101-108 (4m dish required).
NWWS is one method used by television and radio broadcasters to activate the local Emergency Alert System (EAS). NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards (NWR) is the other.
*Up to four times a month, planned NWS server-farm transitions have a 10-90 minute synchronization outage to allow for security patches, software updates, and other planned system maintenance. Time to recover after a server transition can be reduced with proper system set-up, DNS configuration, and access through firewalls. Users should restart their system after each transition to ensure proper NWWS-OI connectivity. If there are reconnection issues, the Senior Duty Meteorologist is available 24 hours/day.
Transition information will be posted under Notices; next to the operational status on the upper right of this webpage.
NWWS Program Office hours: M-F 8am-5pm ET.
NWWS-OI Set-up Information
This set-up can be used in Pidgin (or other XMPP readers) to verify or test account access/availability; especially if the User_ID and password failed to grant access and an error occurred.
See CONFIGURATION for specific input for XMPP readers.
Some NWWS application software can be set up for “tone alert” notification(s), and text messages can be sent to braille printers.
Critical alerts and warnings are the same that are sent over local Emergency Alert Systems (EAS) and sent to Wireless Emergency Alert (WEA) capable telephones.
Issues
During monthly transitions, some users lose connectivity with the NWWS-OI due to security firewall and DNS settings until the next transition. Be sure to allow both IP addresses through security firewall(s).
During monthly transitions, users that lose connectivity should reset the NWWS-OI software application or restart their computer system to correct the problem.
There is currently an update issue where users may experience random disconnects or account authentication errors. Please be patient, these issues eventually self-correct. Some systems may time-out attempting to connect; if this happens wait 30-minutes and then attempt to connect to the NWWS-OI.
Recommended Solutions
Please ensure the IP addresses are properly configured within your system and for your firewall access;
NWWS-OI Boulder: nwws-oi-bldr.weather.gov
NWWS-OI College Park: nwws-oi-cprk.weather.gov
NWWS-OI can be served by either of the two domain names.
Users should make sure that their firewalls are open for both IP addresses that are behind the domain names, but should allow their DNS systems to determine which IP is the active server.
