teamWeather Blog
The National Weather Service (NWS) this week released a new prototype to inspire users of the cloud service Twitter to report their current weather conditions at their location. Using geocoding and hash tags, the NWS is asking for people to try this new service while they collect information to see how it could change storm reporting and citizen weather observations.
The National Weather Service over the years has been trying to get more citizens involved with preparing and sending weather reports across the nation. They started with programs such as the Citizen’s Weather Observer Program which allows users to send conditions reported by their Personal Weather Station (PWS) to be found in an expansive database at the National Weather Service.
NWS is asking Twitter users to turn on geocoding on their mobile device or use a certain format, as specified in their service detail document, to report weather conditions using their mobile devices or personal computers. The format for users that enabled geocoding on their Twitter account is as followed:
#wxreport WW ...
After the “WW” they expect a user to place an accurate and quick weather report of the conditions they are experiencing. If the location had a snow squall a user could put “Snow squalls and heavy drifting snow” as an example report.
The report would be saved into Twitter and then be searchable by everyone including the NWS. The only problem is that if a user’s profile is enabled for a protected profile the results and reports would not show up in the search engine on Twitter.
The NWS is currently using the Twitter Search API to find hash tags that match the “wxreport” tag name. They then parse the post and store it in a database on their server where they can access the information through a mapping interface to view similar or odd reports.
A reporter from Popular Science and discussions on StormTrack show that the NWS is partnering with car companies to build Personal Weather Station components into cars, including pressure and temperature sensors, to report back to Twitter with Weather Reports. This does have its advantages and downsides, but many details have been left out at this time.
If you would like more information on this technology visit the National Weather Service’s web site at http://www.srh.noaa.gov/srh/twitter/twitter.php.
Please note that many places are banning cellular phones and laptop devices from being used in a car while driving. It is not advised to Twitter, text, or use your mobile devices while driving on the road.
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