National Weather Service forecast offices have failed to provide sufficient advance warning of tornado outbreaks that are shredding homes and businesses with alarming regularity, a Commerce Department inspector general probe found.
A nearly two-year evaluation of NWS performance on tornado forecasting concluded that the agency, which faces mounting scrutiny over its forecasting capabilities amid personnel losses, “has consistently fallen short of meeting performance goals for probability of detection and warning lead times” since 2011.
Those goals were established in the 2017 Weather Act, which among other provisions mandated that NWS create a “Tornado Warning Improvement and Extension Program” to measure its ability to “reduce the loss of life and economic losses from tornadoes through the development and extension of accurate, effective, and timely forecasts, predictions and warnings, including the prediction of tornadoes one hour in advance.”
The report makes six recommendations to improve the National Weather Service’s performance. They include “setting time-bound goals with clear resource expectations, relevant control activities, and performance measures” related to tornado warnings, and to “conduct an assessment of how NWS’s tornado watch and warning communications affect the public’s actions to reduce loss of life or property.”
