National Blend of Models in Central Region

Jun 04, 2019

Animation of Central Region Snow loop on Jan 18, 2020 by NBM

On June 4, 2019, NWS Central Region turned off regional blends like SuperBlend and WModel, and started using NBM v3.1 to initialize all the forecast grids beyond the short term (roughly Days 3-7, twice daily).

This is a years-long culmination of collaboration between many hard-working MDL employees (Robby James, Dave Rudack, Eric Engle, Phil Shafer, Carly Buxton, Mike Baker, Cassie Stearns, Andrew Benjamin, John Wagner, Scott Scallion, Dana Strom, Linden Wolf, Tamarah Curtis, and Wei Yan) and dedicated NWS Central Region personnel in order to achieve a significant WRN Roadmap milestone and to help ensure the critical success of the entire NWS Evolve initiative.

Implementation of the NBM didn't happen overnight.  It occurred as a result of several years of planning, development and hard work, with the SuperBlend and ForecastBuilder initiatives led by the Central Region Grid Methodology Advisory Team serving as the key foundation.  The importance of this groundbreaking work over the past decade cannot be overstated.

The NBM will continue to steadily evolve and improve.  NWS Forecasters will continue to play a role in the process.  Eventually, there will also be an increase in the number of probabilistic fields delivered by the NBM and by harnessing such probabilistic procedures we will help the NWS continue to deliver world-class IDSS.

Of course, NBM implementation is a single component of a much larger evolution across the NWS.  By leveraging technology and ever-improving NWP in this manner, we have an opportunity to expand our partner engagement (including IDSS), prepare more effectively for impactful weather events, place greater focus on short term weather threats, and ultimately do a better job meeting our important mission.