Closure of weather offices

[moodychief]

Has anyone seen the slight of hand the FAA magicians are practicing? While everyone is up in arms about contract towers closing, the FAA is quietly behind the scenes executing a plan to close all of the contract weather offices. Theses are the folks that took over the weather from the old flight service stations 20+ years ago. Instead of having an obepserver with 15-20 years experience, the task is forced onto a LAWRS certified controller (16 hour course). No offense meant to controllers as I think you have a pretty full plate already. The CWO observers are the ones that ensure the information fed into the weather system computers is correct and the computerized equipment doesn't populate erroneous observations. This info eventually ends up on our devices in the form of METARs.

It may be too late to save this but I encourage a quick call to action for everyone to contact their congressman. See link below for the list and deadlines.

http://www.stuckmic.com/atc-chatter/23680-faa-memo-natca-cwo-closure-list.html

[Marauder]

Didn't know this was occurring and not surprised it is. I'm sure just like the criteria used to select towers for closure, they are probably looking at the activity at these flight stations and closing them accordingly. With the increasing usage of DUATS and the integrated Wx reporting capabilities in the tablet apps, I'm not at all surprised. Quite honestly, short of the occasional PIREP I file with them, I just don't talk to them. I know some of my local pilot friends use them all the time, but with the proliferation of available online weather, I find enough information available to he me make the decision. Don't get me wrong, when I was VFR only, there was nothing more comforting than hearing from the briefer "You should be okay VFR along your route". No software package is going to do that for you.

[co2bruce]

How can you expect the government to maintain service when we are forcing them to cut 2% in the "growth" of spending. This is nothing more than a political move to get their way. It's very sad, and I feel it will result in tragedy somewhere.

[moodychief]

Don't confuse this with the Lockheed Martin briefers. These offices are the actual weather observers that don't talk to anyone. It is their weather observations that you see on DUATS and all other weather streams of information. These observers are usually the official reporting points that feed aviation information to the National Weather Service. Yesterday after a front pushed through, I was talking with our local observer. In less than an hour, he had to correct the automatic weather feed at least 10 times as it was not generating the complete picture of weather at our airport. The automated weather wanted to push special reports worse than what was actually observed. So you can see this can impact both VFR and IFR operations alike.

[1964-M20E]

Yes and the problem with over reporting bad conditions is you will not believe them when they are actually bad.

[jrwilson]

I was an FAA contract observer during college, awesome job for a college kid and meant no student loans. Working graveyard was tough though.

[jrwilson]

I was an FAA contract observer during college, awesome job for a college kid and meant no student loans. Working graveyard was tough though.

[skobie]

Hi guys.  I am a weather observer at 2 New York State A-level (for the purposes of weather observing, a larger sized airport) airports.  It seems the FAA is trying to run this plan through under the cover of night as they have not admitted anything, even though we have an actual copy of their plan which gets going next Wednesday (May 01, 2013) with the closure of 14 of 123 weather observation offices nationwide (only Alaska non-towered sites are on hold until next year).  The rest of the sites will be shut down and transferred over to ATC personnel by no later than the end of this coming summer.  We are a group of about 900 certified observers accross the United States.  There will be absolutely nothing left of our program and we certainly know that ATC personnel cannot do our jobs.  They don't have the time, background, nor do they think that they should be doing our job in the first place.  And rightfully so.  They already have a pretty important job I would sayl 

 

We could use some help. I don't know who you guys can contact, but I can tell you who we've been contacting with mixed results.  The FAA, the 14 User Groups that agreed to and help make the weather observation standards that we abide by, climatology offices at the federal, regional, and state levels, and news media.  Unfortunately, people have only reported on the problem, not offered to help fix the problem.    If you guys belong to any of these groups (or even if you don't), call, email, or write the top dogs and tell them how it's going to affect you as pilots, etc and tell them to put an end to this nonsense.  The big wigs in the FAA seem to want to try and close us down every few years, but this time we believe it is a real threat.  We'd really appreciate your help.  Here is a list of the all important User Groups that we think can put an end to this garbage.

 

-All User Groups (14 of them):

 

1.) Airlines for America (A4A)
Nicholas Calio, President and CEO

Email: ncalio@airlines.org

Dan Elwell

senior vice president, safety, security and operations

Email: delwell@airlines.org

1301 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Suite 1100
Washington, DC 20004
Phone: 202.626.4000
Email: a4a@airlines.org
http://www.airlines.org/Pages/Home.aspx
 

2.) Aircraft Owners and Pilots Association (AOPA)
Craig Fuller, President

Attn: Air Safety Foundation (ASF)

421 Aviation Way
Frederick, Maryland 21701.
Phone: 301.695.2000
Fax: 301.695.2375

Phone 800-872-2672

http://www.aopa.org/

3.) Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA)
Captain Lee Moak, ALPA President

1625 Massachusetts Ave NW
Washington, DC 20036
Phone: 703.689.2270

http://www.alpa.org/

4.) American Association of Airport Executives (AAAE)

Operations, Safety, and Planning Committee

Chairman, Carl Newman, A.A.E., Houston Airport System

Email: Carl.Newman@houstontx.gov

601 Madison Street, Suite 400
Alexandria, VA 22314
Phone: 703.824.0504
Fax: 703.820.1395

webmaster@aaae.org

http://www.aaae.org/

 

5.) Airline Dispatchers Federation (ADF)
Joseph Miceli - President

Email: jmiceli@dispatcher.org

2020 Pennsylvania Ave NW # 821
Washington, DC 20006
Phone: 800.OPN.CNTL
Email: adfboard@dispatcher.org

http://www.dispatcher.org/

 

6.) Airports Council International - North America (ACI)
David N. Edwards, Jr., Executive Committee Chairman

Email: dedwards@aci-na.org
Greg Principato,ACI-NA President

Email: gprincipato@aci-na.org

Email: memberservices@aci-na.org

1615 L Street NW Suite 300
Washington, DC 20036
Phone: 202.293.8500
Fax: 202.331.1362

(888) 424-7767 toll-free

Email: tsmith@aci-na.org

www.aci-na.org

7.) Experimental Aircraft Association (EAA)
Sean Elliott, EAA Vice President of Advocacy and Safety

EAA Aviation Center

3000 Poberezny Rd
Oshkosh, WI 54902
Phone: 920.426.4800
Phone: 800.564.6322
Fax: 920.426.6761
Email: webmaster@eaa.org

http://www.eaa.org/

 

8.) Helicopter Association International (HAI)
Christopher E. Erickson, Chairman

Matt Zuccaro, President

Email: tailrotor@aol.com

1635 Prince Street
Alexandria, Virginia 22314-2818
Phone: 703.683.4646
Fax: 703.683.4745

http://www.rotor.com/
 

9.) National Business Aviation Association (NBAA)
Richard Shine, Chairman
Edward M. Bolen, President and CEO

Benjamin Schwalen, NBAA counsel & corporate secretary

Email: bschwalen@nbaa.org

1299 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Suite 550
Washington, DC 20004
Phone: 202.783.9000
Fax: 202.331.8364
Email: info@nbaa.org

www.nbaa.org

 

10.) Allied Pilots Association (APA)
Captain Keith Wilson, APA President
14600 Trinity Blvd., Suite 500 Fort Worth, TX 76155-2512

Phone: 817.302.2272

Email: Public-Comment@alliedpilots.org

http://public.alliedpilots.org/apa/default.aspx

11.) General Aviation Manufacturers Association (GAMA)
Pete Bunce, President & CEO

1400 K Street NW, Suite 801
Washington, DC 20005
Phone: 202.393.1500
Fax: 202.842.4063
Email: bforan@GAMA.aero

http://www.gama.aero/

 

12.) National Association of State Aviation Officials (NASAO)
Thomas M. Booth, Jr., NASAO Chairman Henry M. Ogrodzinski, NASAO President & CEO (Ex-Officio)

Washington National Airport
Hangar 7 - Suite 218
Washington DC, 20001
Phone: 703.417.1883

http://www.nasao.org/

13.) Alaskan Aviation Safety Foundation (AASF)
Harry Kieling, Chairman

farnorthflyers@gci.net

C/O Aviation Technology Division UAA
2811 Merrill Field Dr.
Anchorage, AK 99501
Phone: 907.243.7237
Fax: 907.786.7273
Email: aasf@alaska.net

http://www.aasfonline.org/

14.) Regional Airline Association (RAA)
Roger Cohen, President

Scott Foose, Senior Vice President- Operations & Safety
(202) 367-1212

Email: Foose@raa.org

2025 M Street, NW Suite 800
Washington, DC 20036-3309
Phone: 202.367.1170
Fax: 202.367.2170
Email: raa@raa.org

http://www.raa.org/

 

Thanks for your help.

 

Sincerely,

skobie

[moodychief]

Skokie,

Can you share with everyone the importance of your observations as it relates to aviation weather. I think some people think XM weather is all automated without any imput from humans. Please enlighten us.

[skobie]

Yes I can.  I will try to be brief.  Weather observers edit (augment what ASOS cannot do at all or backup what ASOS can do but is getting wrong) basically everything you see in a typical METAR/SPECI other than the time.  ASOS is of course the Automated Surface Observing System that was given to the FAA/DOD by the National Weather Service about 15-20 years ago and I believe kind of sold to them as a truly automated system that would not need human interaction.  ASOS are located at just about every airport across the nation.  Of course, the NWS may have just wanted to stop paying their own government empolyees/ contract personnel to edit ASOS and to some extent some government agency ruled that the NWS should not be providing aviation observations and that the FAA should take care of that.

 

At any rate, observers typically backup winds, visibility, cloud coverage and heights, temperature and dewpoint.  The most typical backups come in visibility and cloud coverge and heights, which can be changing fairly constantly in a heavy rain or snowstorm situation.  There are also a whole slew of remarks that must be augmented when applicable such as tornado and funnel cloud distance, location, and movement, thunderstorm location and movement (not to mention significant cloud types like CBs and TCUs and their location and movement), lightning location and frequency, ice pellets and freezing rain (don't let anyone try to tell you that ASOS can properly pick up on freezing rain by the way), variable and sector visibility, variable sky condition as well as clouds above 12,000 feet, not to mention snow increasing and actual snow on the ground, blowing snow, dust, sand, smoke, etc, and many more augments that I'm sure I'm forgetting.

 

At the risk of sounding like an advertisement, the bottom line is this: The ATC personnel are not going to consistently and properly back up and augment ASOS because they either don't know how to, are too busy actually doing their ATC job, or don't believe it should be part of their job description (and I don't blame them).  In other words, ASOS will end up running by itself with very little human interaction and good luck with getting an accurate METAR that is up to date.  And I haven't even started to talk about ASOS sensors that go out to service for days (not just hours) at a time where things have to be backed up every single METAR or they'll appear as M (missing) or just not part of the METAR at all and the nearest Flight Service Station has to be called to put the real observation on to the internet so everyone can get the METAR.  Or the junk that ASOS will try to pump out when the weather is perfect.  Trust me, there are alot of gremlins at work or ASOS does have a mind of its own.  Either way, let's face it, ASOS is built on 1980s technology and even if they came out with a brand new ASOS built on today's technology, it would still need human interaction.  ASOS is basically a slow, pathetic piece of technology that cannot keep up with the brain power of a human constantly watching the weather and cannot be trusted.   I sometimes wonder if it wouldn't be eaier to go back to the old days of manual, non-automated observations because sometimes ASOS actually creates more work in trying to edit it when it's getting things wrong, which is basically every bad weather situation. 

 

I am not trying to offend anyone by the above statement about ATC personnel, I am just trying to be honest of what I have seen at low traffic airports where they are already tasked with editing ASOS.  Imagine high traffic airports or high traffic airports in bad weather situations (thunderstorms, snowstorms, etc.) and someone who already is extremely busy, having to worry about doing a second job.  It's just not possible that things are going to get done and then there's going to be an accident.  Let ATC do their jobs and let weather observers do theirs.  If you guys use this data, and I'm sure that you do, then please contact not just congressmen, but the User Groups listed above, as well as the FAA higher ups if you know any.  They need to hear from people who actually use this data. 

 

Thanks for listening,

skobie

[moodychief]

AAAE is meeting with the FAA in the next few days and this is one of the priority topics. They will be asking a lot of hard questions including why the FAA isn't following their own plan of meeting with the stakeholders (airports and airlines) and including them in the process. There are CWOs expected to close on May 1 and the airports have not even been contacted by the FAA.

[bd32322]

The news is out at least from the AOPA newsletter - so this issue is thankfully now known !

[skobie]

Hi again everyone.  I haven't posted on here in awhile.  Unfortunately, I come with a bit of bad news again.  To summarize, like you may be aware from 2 years ago, the FAA again has plans to transfer several dozen weather observing stations from CWO to LAWRS. Some of you may already be LAWRS observers in addition to ACT specialists. Unlike 2 years ago, the FAA is "only" planning to initially transition 57 stations (out of approximately 140) around the US. If that's not bad enough, I believe this is just a cover until the FAA can try to transfer all CWOs to LAWRS. They're just using the divide and conquer method this time because they didn't get their way last time.

If you don't like what you are about to read, then please advise your ATC managers and tell them that it is a bad idea. Better yet, if any of you belong to the User Groups listed above please do the same. Many of them probably don't even know about this transition plan yet, so feel free to show them it. The FAA plans to start soliciting ATC personnel starting in mid July, with some suggesting a possible changeover as early as October 1 of this year! However, it would be nice if they/you had a heads up. If the FAA gets enough pushback, I don't believe it will happen. So that is where you guys can help. You may be surprised to find your site on the transition list at the end of the document. This document is official:

Thank You For Any Help,
skobie
Weather Observer

new faa transition plan May 2015.pdf

[carusoam]

Skobie,

Thank you for the update.

Do you, or somebody representing your group, have a direct contact with AOPA?

AOPA is our association that best handles our interface with:

Government bodies

Safety issues

Weather

Let us know who your contact is. If you don't have the appropriate one, we can probably help you with that as well.

I wish you the best of luck. You are in a real tough spot.

AOPA has the ability to understand your situation, make it understandable to private pilots, and then deliver it to the private pilot population.

You are welcome to give more details here as well.

My challenge is, I have read your post, and I still don't understand much about the source of my weather briefings...

I clearly don't get how they will change.

Best regards,

-a-

[skobie]

carusoam,

 

I had been in contact with a young lady named Melissa McCaffrey (Regional Manager|Western Pacific Region), but she is transitioning to a new job.  She said she will forward my information to her replacement, but who knows who that will be and if they'll be as thorough as her.  She helped us out a couple of years ago when the FAA tried to shut us down, so I was disappointed that she was moving on.  If you have a contact for us, that would be great!

 

As far as what we do and what will change, we do not give briefings.  We take and disseminate surface weather observation as dedicated individuals and the FAA wants to transition our jobs to ATC personnel as they have at much lower traffic airports (where the job is not done even satisfactorily at all).  Long story short, the FAA keeps scheming up ways to get rid of us to save very little of their massive budget because I really don't think they understand what we do either!

 

Thank for any help,

skobie

[moodychief]

Carusoam,

 

I will try to partially answer your question.  The foundation of our weather comes from sensors located on airports or reporting stations.  The sensors only record what the computer can extrapolate from the immediate area of the sensor.  The weather observer gives the human touch of what they can visually see 360 degrees in the local area.  Also, if there is a frontal area moving through they insert special observations updating what the machines report.  If you relied strictly on the sensors, you may show clear with 15,000 ft overcast.  Since the human can see a larger area, and not what is just above or immediate to the sensors, you would get a better picture of 500 scattered, 5,000 few with 15,000 overcast. 

[MyNameIsNobody]

Skobie, I understand you are not in Illinois...

I do Duats exclusively. I don't need the soft comforting voice...and we are way over due for some major cutting of the Federal Government. Close 'em down. Appologies to al those college kids that don't get a fine paying government gig...

[MyNameIsNobody]

For some of you that don't "get it"...Skokie is in Illinois and Skobie likes snacks and to sound the alarm for more of the same "Big Spending" by the Feds.

[skobie]

Moodychief, it's good to hear from you again!  You were the one who brought light to this same situation last time around on this message board.  And if anyone has a direct contact within AOPA, I would appreciate it if you could forward it to me.  Thank you in advance for wanting to keep our skies safe.

 

skobie

[carusoam]

Skobie,

Check for pm (envelope icon) at the top of your screen...

Best regards,

-a-