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NWS Wilmington Online Snow Spotter Program |
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| What Is The Online Snow Spotter Program? |
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The online snow spotter program is an effort to increase
our real time snow reports during and after snow events
throughout the winter. The goal is to receive quality
snowfall reports from across our area while keeping the
reporting and displaying procedures as simple as possible.
Snowfall reports will be sent to our office through an online
website. These reports will be updated on our webpage during
snow events. They will also be included in our snow
summaries that are sent out from our office periodically
during and after snow events.
Along with measuring snowfall, spotters are asked to report
icing due to freezing rain or freezing drizzle, and any
time thunder is associated with snow or freezing rain.
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| How To Become An Online Snow Spotter |
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If you are already one of our spotters and have attended a storm
spotter training session in the past two years, you can use your
eSpotter account to
enter snowfall reports. If you don't have an eSpotter account, but
you are one of our spotters and have attended a storm spotter training session
in the last two years, you can request one through the
eSpotter website.
If you are not a trained spotter but would still be interested
in becoming an online snow spotter, please
email us
for more information.
On certain occasions, we may call our snow spotters to solicit
snowfall reports. We will only call at times you have given us
permission to call. If you are a severe weather spotter, this
information will be taken off the application you filled out at
the training class. If you are an online snow spotter and are
willing to be called for snowfall reports, please
email us.
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We are most interested in snow amounts during and after an event.
The program will key off of Storm Total Snowfall so be
sure to report your Storm Total Snowfall (minus any snow
already on the ground from previous events) when using the
eSpotter program. If you want to report Sleet or Icing,
report that amount in the Storm Total Icing section.
An event is defined as weather associated with the same low
pressure or storm system, and may extend from a few hours
to a few days. A break in precipitation of a day or more
usually defines separate events. Other supplemental
information that can be reported in addition to Storm
Total Snowfall includes the following items.
- 1" or more of snow per hour.
- 1" or more of snow during the past 24 hours.
- When first measuring 2", 4", or 6" of snow.
- Snow depth.
- Any freezing rain or freezing drizzle.
- Any thunder or lightning associated with winter precipitation.
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Your reports may occasionally be posted to our website
on a Google map (not to street level accuracy). If you
are interested in having a more precise location for
your report, please email us
with your address. If you know your latitude and
longitude, you can also include that if you like.
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| Reporting Without eSpotter |
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If for some reason you do not want to report through
eSpotter, you are still welcome to call our office with
snowfall reports using the procedures outlined in the
spotter training classes. These reports will also be
included in the snow summaries issued from our office.
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See our Snow Measuring page for more information on how to properly measure snow.
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www.nws.noaa.gov
