1. Introduction - Calendar year 1999 was a time of great change in the HPC.  New systems were introduced to operations and older systems retired, and a major retraining of staff was undertaken on short notice to meet the requirements of the Quantitative Precipitation Forecast (QPF) Process Assessment Team and the needs of the NWS field offices.  Most importantly, the HPC product suite was revamped near the end of the year to implement those needs and requirements.  HPC staff also participated in Hurricane Liaison Team (HLT) briefings to FEMA and the emergency management community on several landfalling tropical cyclones, including Hurricane Floyd.  Finally, HPC provided briefings for the Y2K rollover period for the President’s Council on Y2K.

2.  Major Accomplishments -  HPC’s most significant accomplishments over the past year are documented below in roughly chronological order.

• AWIPS Delivered - AWIPS workstations were delivered to HPC the week of March 1, 1999 with training for most staff the following two weeks.  Acceptance of the system occurred on March 6, 1999. The system is used routinely in operations, although AWIPS does not yet have the tools needed by HPC for graphic product preparation.

• HPC Review By UCAR - A team of distinguished scientists conducted an on-site review of the HPC on March 3-4, 1999.  An overarching finding that “HPC provides a valuable service to the Nation” was quite favorable and was accompanied by a number of recommendations for improvements.  Those recommendations called for increased training and staff development, increased science and technology infusion, improvements in verification and the surface analysis products, and more formal ties to the NCEP Environmental Modeling Center.  The detailed final findings and recommendations were briefed to NWS Director Kelly in October 1999.  The review proved quite helpful, with many steps subsequently taken by HPC to address the recommendations.

• Retirement of Legacy Intergraph System - HPC graphics had been created on the Intergraph workstation system for many years.  The system, however, was non-Y2K compliant and had outlived its usefulness.  NCO’s Computing Development Branch supplied software patches at the end of March to enable the transition of the last Intergraph functions involved with HPC operations to N-AWIPS workstations.  Final forecaster training was completed in early April and the Intergraph equipment was removed April 19.

• Successful Haj Forecast From HPC’s International Desks -  The Saudi Minister of Haj (the yearly Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca in April) awarded the Saudi Arabian weather service (MEPA) a Certificate of Outstanding Weather Forecasting and Monitoring for the great work MEPA did this year during the Haj.  The Certificate was a direct result of the efforts of the Saudi Arabia Desk in HPC’s International Desks and the services the Saudi nationals stationed here provided as part of their training.

• Survey, Feedback, Action -  The HPC and MPC staff held a number of meetings related to the Survey, Feedback, Action (SFA) program.  This NOAA program had as its goal the improvement of office functions through free exchange of suggestions by both staff and managers.  Ideas ranged from ways to communicate better, to resolving perceptions of hostile working conditions, to water-quality testing.  Several teams and actions were identified to help resolve the items raised at the meetings.

• Ergonomic Issues in HPC and MPC Addressed -  HPC and MPC worked on ergonomic issues related to the workstations used in preparing their operational products.  Dave Feit, MPC Marine Forecast Branch Chief, contacted OSHA to seek assistance in identifying solutions to the ergonomic problems.  An ergonomist of OSHA's Ergonomics Office visited the centers on June 10, met with some of the staff, looked at our workstation set up, and made recommendations for improvements.  Implementation of the suggestions led to a marked decrease in ergonomic problems in the workplace.

• HPC Provided NCEP Liaison - Ed Danaher, Development and Training Branch Chief, assumed the position of NCEP Liaison to NWS Headquarters (NWSH) for the period of June and July.  He participated in a number of useful meetings, represented NCEP and HPC interests, and provided feedback to and from the NCEP Director.

• NWS QPF Team Report - NWS Director John Kelly charged a team with the review of the NWS Quantitative Precipitation Forecast (QPF) process.  Dave Reynolds, HPC Forecast Operations Branch Chief, was part of the team.  The team’s report, approved by the NWS Corporate Board in August, called for the centralization of some QPF functions into HPC, with the exception of the Western Region where additional testing will take place during the winter of 1999-2000 to make a final determination of the responsibility.  HPC staff made visits to all the continental U.S. River Forecast Centers (RFCs) to discuss the products and services from HPC under the new process.  Additionally, HPC worked with the California-Nevada RFC and the Northwest RFC to finalize plans for the Western Region QPF Assessment, which began November 1.  Internally, the HPC restructured operations and reassigned duties to allocate additional forecasters to prepare QPF products.  The first phase of the restructuring occurred on November 8 when the three hydrometeorological technicians assumed the responsibilities previously performed by interns.  The interns then assumed responsibility for preparing the surface analyses, and the surface analysts took over the basic weather forecast function.  To ensure the needed software development was progressing smoothly, HPC managers and developers met weekly with NCO developers to discuss NMAP enhancements to prepare the new QPF products.  NCO delivered the required software by December 1.  The restructuring was completed as scheduled on December 6.

• HPC Supported Hurricane Liaison Team -  John Murray, FEMA, came to HPC on August 9 to discuss HPC's expanded role in the HLT.  The HLT is a joint FEMA/NWS team that tailors information on tropical cyclones and their potential impacts for federal and state emergency managers.  The HLT was expanding its operations to include the impacts of heavy rains and possible flooding as the systems move inland.  As the NWS center of excellence in heavy precipitation forecasting, HPC took the lead in providing this information.  As a result of this meeting, HPC staff provided very informative videoteleconference briefings as part of the HLT during Hurricanes Brett, Dennis, Floyd, Irene, and Lenny.

• HPC Major Product Suite Revisions - On December 5, HPC began issuing the Model Diagnostic Discussion (MDD) on an operational basis two times each day.  This message describes the major model runs and how HPC forecasters interpret the models’ (primarily the Eta, NGM, and AVN models) handling of the most significant weather systems for the next several days.  Known model biases, observational problems, and short-term verification, for examples, are included in the descriptions.  The MDD assists NWS forecasters and others in the meteorological community in interpreting and using the NCEP model output.  On December 6, to begin the Operational Test and Evaluation of the new NWS QPF process, HPC revised the suite of QPF products to include individual forecasts for each 6-hour period out to 72 hours.  Previously, 6-hour forecasts only extended to 30 hours.  Implemented at the same time was the use of the measurable (that is, 0.01 inch) contour on the graphics.  Forecasts to day 3 were also added.  The winter weather products from HPC were also changed.  The heavy snow products were transformed to a probabilistic format and now include the probability of ice accretion as well as snow.   Finally, to make way for the new products and because it had outlived its usefulness, the Air Stagnation Narrative was discontinued on December 6.  These revisions and new products were prompted by interactions with NWSH, regions, and field offices to meet our partners’ needs.  The implementations required months of planning and training and the reassignment of existing staff to establish an additional work desk with two shifts per day.

• HPC Supported Y2K Information Coordination Center (ICC) - HPC Deputy Director Kevin McCarthy attended a meeting on December 10 at the Y2K ICC to discuss the weather support HPC would provide for the Y2K roll-over period.  On December 14, he provided two video teleconference briefings to the Y2K ICC to demonstrate the support HPC would provide and, using information provided by the Climate Prediction Center, he also gave an outlook for the roll-over period.  The second briefing was primarily for the Chair of the President's Council for Year 2000 Conversion ICC, John Koskinen.  HPC established a special web site with products from HPC and CPC to assist the ICC in monitoring weather across the U.S. during the roll-over period.  Daily briefings were given to the Y2K ICC on December 28 and 29, 1999, and twice each day for the period from December 30 through January 1, 2000.  Photo of HPC Staff at the beginning of Y2K

• Isaac Cline Award - Bob Oravec was selected as HPC’s recipient in the meteorology category for the inaugural edition of this NWS-wide award.  Bob provided exceptional medium-range forecast guidance to field offices in the upper Mid West for December 29-30, 1998.  Bob correctly identified the potential for a major blizzard for the New Year’s weekend.  Chicago received its second highest 24-hour snowfall total on record from this storm.

• NOAA Administrator’s Award -  Norman “Wes” Junker was given the prestigious Administrator’s Award for his extensive efforts in advancing quantitative precipitation forecasting in the NWS.  Wes is recognized nationally and internationally for his expertise in QPF.  Since 1983, he has spent much of his career improving QPF science through research, numerical weather prediction model interpretation, and comprehensive training of NWS field forecasters.

4.   Pictures of the HPC