The National Weather Service and National Hurricane Center have adopted changes for 2013, effective immediately, for the handling of post tropical cyclones. This comes after intense criticism of Sandy.
Some of the major changes include allowing the NHC to continue posting Advisories, Watches and Warnings. Prior to this change, as soon as a storm is deemed non-tropical forecasting and nowcasting duties are passed on to the Weather Prediction Center (formerly the Hydrometeorological Prediction Center). This change will also allow Tropical Watches and Warnings to be posted as well, even if a system will no longer be tropical.
The first part of the change is a win for everyone. I know how some people feel about NOAA and the NWS, but the NHC is a specialized agency, which has extremely well educated, trained and experienced forecasters who not only know tropical cyclones, but all types of weather. The NHC is one of only a few NWS Offices that has such highly trained forecasters. This is a no-brainer change, that should have happened with Sandy, whether it broke protocol or not. With such accurate forecasts, the NHC was able to call Sandy becoming post or non tropical prior to making landfall, which eliminated the posting of Tropical Advisories, Watches and Warnings. Which leads me into them. I, personally, do not feel it necessary to post Tropical Advisories, Watches and Warnings for a non-tropical or post tropical system. While, there were not any Tropical Watches or Warnings, there were plenty of High Wind Watches/Warnings, Flood Watches/Warnings, etc...everyone was well aware of what was coming. The National Weather Services Philadelphia and New York City did an excellent job in preparing for the event...which in turn, I relayed right to our posts. I believe this is just more "dumbing" down of weather, however, many local, county, state and Federal agencies believe that people will take more heed to a Tropical Storm or Hurricane Watch or Warning than they will to the others. This could become problematic for some with insurance issues and beneficial to others. Either way, it is a done deal and will be reflected, if necessary, in any storms from this point forward.
Here is a link to the news release from the NHC.
NHC News Release
