Industry may have answer to weather forecasting blind spot.

• Author: Tadjdeh, Yasmin

* The United States faces a gap in future weather forecasts. From less accurate to untimely predictions, there could be dire consequences for the U.S. population and economy, warned a recent Government Accountability Office report.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System is nearing the end of its lifespan. When decommissioned, NOAA will lose some of the essential weather data provided by the system for between 17 to 53 months, the GAO found. The blind spot could materialize as early as 2014.

"A satellite data gap would result in less accurate and timely weather forecasts and warnings of extreme events, such as hurricanes, storm surges and floods. Such degradation in forecasts and warnings would place lives, property and our nation's critical infrastructures in danger," said the GAO in its 2013 High Risk Report.

Polar-orbiting satellites are often used to provide data about severe weather. They typically can forecast storms three to five days out. The Joint Polar Satellite System (JPSS) will replace NOAA's current constellation, but there could be a multi-year degradation of data between the time the current polar-orbiting satellite is decommissioned and when the JPSS is fully functional, the report said.

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Polar-orbiting satellites have provided essential data in recent natural disasters, a study by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts found. During Hurricane Sandy in 2012, data from polar-orbiting satellites predicted the storm would make landfall in New Jersey five days before it hit. Without that data, forecasts could have shown Sandy swirling harmlessly away into the Atlantic Ocean, the study found.

In February 2010, a major nor'easter--dubbed "Snowmageddon"--sacked the Mid-Atlantic region of the United States with up to three feet of snow. The storm knocked out power and stranded thousands of travelers. Major cities along its path, such as Washington, D.C., were at a standstill. Had polar-orbiting satellite data not been available, weather forecasters would have under predicted the snowfall by more than 10 inches, said Mariel Borowitz, a research analyst at the Space Foundation, a Colorado Springs, Colo.-based advocacy group.

"People would not have realized the extent of how that snowstorm would be and would be much less prepared," said Borowitz. "That data makes a huge difference."

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