The South Canadian Amateur Radio Society (SCARS) has been selected as a Weather Ready Nation Ambassador for the National Weather Service.
What is the Weather-Ready Nation (WRN) Ambassador initiative?
One of NOAA’s missions is to save life and property by providing critical environmental intelligence, including weather forecasts and warnings, to our partners and the general public. NOAA wants everyone, from communities across the country, businesses, and the public at large to be ready, responsive, and resilient to extreme weather, water, and climate events. Government cannot achieve success without the support and contributions from partners. NOAA recognizes to build a Weather-Ready Nation requires innovative collaborations with the media, emergency management community, the Weather Enterprise, and other organizations such as businesses and all levels of government. WRN Ambassadors are formally recognized by NOAA as organizations committed to collaborating with NOAA, sharing preparedness messaging in outreach to the public, and serving as examples themselves by implementing resilience best practices.
How does this benefit the nation?
NOAA wants to find ways to collaborate with external organizations in innovative ways to maximize all our efforts toward national resilience. Increased dialog and information sharing will result in reduced redundancy, more consistent weather safety messaging, and improved communication with stakeholders and the general public.
Why become an Ambassador?
Strengthening partnerships begins with greater, more meaningful dialog. The WRN Ambassadors initiative improves the two-way communication between NOAA and its partners. NOAA will send Ambassadors information relevant to the Weather-Ready Nation strategic priority, such as toolkits for preparedness weeks and planning information for WRN-sponsored events. Greater dialog will lead to new innovative opportunities for collaboration, all leading toward greater preparedness, responsiveness, and resilience to extreme events.
What are the duties of a WRN Ambassador?
WRN Ambassadors are expected to maintain active dialog with NOAA (e.g., maintain current point-of-contact and contact information), use where appropriate NOAA-generated information such as preparedness messages, and identify opportunities for collaboration including research initiatives and outreach events.
How does this initiative differ from NWS StormReady®, TsunamiReady™ and other external NOAA preparedness campaigns?
WRN Ambassador initiative focuses on organizations wanting to partner with NOAA toward building a Weather-Ready Nation. National Weather Service (NWS) StormReady and NWS TsunamiReady are well-established programs with a higher level of requirements that need to be met to become recognized. To become a WRN Ambassador, an organization must provide an up-to-date point of contact and contact information, and a commitment to engaging in dialog with NOAA. Other campaigns, such as FEMA’s Ready campaign, are complementary efforts focused on all hazards preparedness. WRN Ambassadors is primarily focused on building unique/customized partnerships to improve not just preparedness but longer-term resilience.
Who can I contact for more information?
A brochure is available to help explain the role of the Ambassador. And, there are a number of success stories that can explain the activites from a number of organizations, from across the country. A list of WRN Ambassadors is available on the web, so you can locate other organizations that share our weather status. Finally, the NWS Weather Ready Nation web page will provide you with all of the details. On this page you’ll find a ton of resources to help you get ready for severe weather.