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NWS2
Wed Jul 14, 2004
Listen in RealAudio 
Hi, I’m Bryan Yeaton, and this is The Weather Notebook. Today, we continue with the
Director of the National Weather Service, David L. Johnson.
BY: So as you come into this job what do you see as some of your biggest challenges?
DJ: Well, one of the biggest ones is to show the taxpayers the value for the investment
that’s been made in the last 3 to 5 years in the Weather Service. Pretty massive
upgrades on weather capability with weather radars and computation cycles in new
super computers.
DJ: Just during my adult lifetime, weather used to be something that you had a
forecast (for) but you certainly wouldn’t change your plans as a result of the weather
forecast. But now, I think you do change your plans, and we’ve stopped saying, "did
they get it right or wrong?" We’ve started saying, "Did they get it at the right hour – they
said it was going to snow but did it snow at 9 o’clock; did it snow at 11:30?" Now
we’re down into adding the values at finer levels of specificity.
BY: When I do weather programs all over the country, people come up and say, "Well,
jeez, it must be great to work in the weather. You can always be wrong." So, how do
we change the public’s perception of that?
DJ: You know what that means is that most of the time you’re right. I think there’s
always opportunity to improve and we’re never going to get it absolutely perfect all the
time. But, at this point in time, I think we’re doing a good job. There’s an opportunity to
do a better job.
We will conclude our chat tomorrow. The Weather Notebook receives generous
support from The National Science Foundation, and Subaru of America.
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