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Weather service zones in new system By PAUL FATTIG Bob Dylan may have been right about not needing a weatherman to know which way the wind blows. National Weather Service office in Medford But the folk singer, should he ever visit the Rogue Valley, might want to know which zone he's in to be prepared for what is blowing in the wind. Last week, the National Weather Service office in Medford began forecasting for 18 different zones within the nine counties under its jurisdiction. "With these zones, we now have more site-specific forecasts," explained Dennis Gettman, science and operations officer at the office located at the Medford airport. "Our customers will be better served because they actually get an extended forecast more attuned to their area," he added. "It'll be more accurate." The zonal weather information, broken down into areas of localized microclimates, is available at the agency's Medford office Web site at www.wrh.noaa.gov/medford The change for the agency, whose national roots go back to the General Weather Service in 1870 when rudimentary forecasts were sent via telegraph, was possible because of new computers and equipment installed in preparation for the next millennium, Gettman said. And, yes, the new computers and their software are Y2K proof, he noted. Until Oct. 13, the agency's three weather service offices in Oregon -- Portland, Medford and Pendleton -- had been issuing one- and two-day forecasts. The extended forecast -- three through five days -- was a generic prediction for the entire state issued out of Portland. Now short-range and extended forecasts are issued out of regional offices for specific sites, Gettman said, adding that the weather is different across the region the office covers. For example, the weather in Medford is often vastly different from what is occurring in Williams n southeastern Josephine County, he said. In addition to high-speed computers installed in the past year, the office now has a state-of-the-art satellite dish to receive weather information. "We no longer get our data primarily over a landline which has limited band width," he said. "Now we get it from a satellite which increases the band width by a factor of 100. We can move more data, allowing us to look at more satellite imagery, more radar information." With computer-generated forecasts, the science of predicting weather is getting better, Gettman observed. "Of course, we still have to modify them with local knowledge," he said. "The people who have been in this office five or six years tend to be better local forecasters than someone who just walked in the door." Gettman, who first walked in the door 20 years ago, said the agency still places a high value on weather watchers out in the different zones. "If we are going to do well in those zones, we need someone out in places like the Williams area to tell us about their weather,'' he said. "We've got folks out in different areas who call us regularly." The Medford office has 11 meteorologists, five hydrological technicians and the science officer. There is also an electronic crew on hand to keep an eye on the computers. Under the guidance of the new national director, retired Air Force Gen. Jack Kelly, who took over earlier this year, the agency has taken a corporate approach to offering its service. A weather forecast is now called a "product." The change in vernacular helps promote the image of an agency providing a service to a customer, Gettman said. "We considered our customer to be the average American citizen that lives in the area -- Joe Public," he said, adding the customer base also includes the media, land management agencies, pilots, commercial fishermen and farmers. The agency is facing stiffer competition -- for example, from television. "There is more competition in the sense that you have more private meteorologists but there are a lot of areas where the private meteorologists don't fill the needs of the public," he said, noting the agency intends to meet those needs. The next millennium will bring more changes in weather forecasting, he predicted. "The way we're headed is to ultimately produce a series of grid points that contain weather forecasts," he said. "The users will click on an area represented by a grid point and out will pop a forecast." That's well after the turn of the century, he said. "The next major change will take place about a year from now when we have regular forecasts out to seven days instead of just five," he said. "Our computer models are getting better." Yet customers will likely want to know what's blowing in the wind in the next millennium, he said. "We actually get calls during the winter from people planning summertime weddings, asking us if it would be good to be outdoors on a specific day in June," he added. "Of course, we can only tell them what the odds are." Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA