Hurricane local statement

{{Short description|Weather advisory in the United States}}

{{Over-quotation|date=December 2019}}

A hurricane local statement (HLS){{cite web |title=H |url=https://w1.weather.gov/glossary/index.php?letter=h |website=National Weather Service Glossary |publisher=National Weather Service |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Silver Spring, Maryland}} is a weather statement produced for the public by the local Weather Forecast Offices of the National Weather Service in the U.S. for areas affected or forecast to be affected by a tropical storm or hurricane that provides an overview of the storm's local effects, including expected weather conditions, evacuation decisions made by local officials, and precautions necessary to protect life and property. The National Weather Services considers the HLS to be the "flagship product" available to Weather Forecast Offices for outlining tropical cyclone watches and warnings and impacts, and is their most visible product during such events.{{cite report|title=Hurricane Irene, August 21–30, 2011 |url=https://www.weather.gov/media/publications/assessments/Irene2012.pdf |publisher=National Weather Service |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Silver Spring, Maryland |type=Service Assessment |date=September 2012}}{{rp|37}}{{cite web |last1=Spratt |first1=Scott M. |last2=Hagemeyer |first2=Bartlett C. |last3=Sharp |first3=David W. |title=Treating Landfalling Hurricanes as Mesoscale Convective Systems - A Paradigm Shift for Weather Forecast Operations |url=https://ams.confex.com/ams/pdfpapers/115029.pdf |publisher=American Meteorological Society |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Melbourne, Florida |date=November 8, 2006}} Descriptions of the affected areas, relevant tropical cyclone watches and warnings, recommendations for precautionary measures, and expected timing and severity of possible threats are typically included in an HLS.{{cite web |title=Hurricane Local Statement (HLS) |url=https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutnhcprod.shtml#HLS |website=NHC Tropical Cyclone Text Product Descriptions |publisher=National Hurricane Center |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Miami, Florida}} The HLS can incorporate projected impacts from pre-written descriptions tailored for different storm intensities; these template descriptions were developed in the 1990s and became widely available to forecasters for use in the HLS by 2001.{{cite conference|last1=Goldsmith |first1=Barry S. |title=How NWS Impact Statements Were Used to Communicate Imminent Danger From Severe Hurricanes|conference=27th Conference on Hurricanes and Tropical Meteorology |url=https://ams.confex.com/ams/pdfpapers/107735.pdf |publisher=American Meteorological Society |access-date=December 7, 2020 |date=April 25, 2006}} The bulletin issued by the Weather Forecast Office in Slidell, Louisiana, as Hurricane Katrina approached on August 28, 2005, known as "The Bulletin", was lauded by the National Weather Service as having further encouraged vulnerable individuals to evacuate.{{cite web |title=Hurricane Katrina August 23-31, 2005 |type=Service Assessment |url=ftp://ftp.library.noaa.gov/noaa_documents.lib/NWS/Assessments/Hurricane-Katrina_2005.pdf |publisher=National Weather Service |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Silver Spring, Maryland |date=June 2006}} Not all forecast offices can issue an HLS.{{cite letter| first = Allison| last = Allen| recipient = Subscribers to the NOAA Weather Wire Service, Emergency Managers Weather Ifnromation Network, NOAAPORT, and Other NWS Partners and NWS Employees| subject = Four NWS Southern Region Weather Forecast Offices (WFOs) will stop issuing tropical cyclone forecast products effective on or about June 1, 2017| date = March 9, 2017| url = https://www.weather.gov/media/notification/pdfs/scn17-25sr_trop_program.pdf | access-date = December 7, 2020}}

Locally-tailored statements regarding hurricanes have been a part of the National Weather Service's hurricane warning program since the inception of the modern National Weather Service in 1970 and were carried over from the U.S. Weather Bureau that preceded it.{{cite book |title=Operations of the National Weather Service |date=October 1970 |publisher=National Weather Service |location=Silver Spring, Maryland |page=25 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=SLh0kH_HFPQC |via=Google Books |access-date=December 7, 2020 |chapter=The Hurricane Warning Program (Hurricane and Tornado Warning Service)}}{{cite book |title=Operations of the Weather Bureau |date=April 1, 1967 |publisher=Weather Bureau |location=Silver Spring, Maryland |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=1AIIAAAAIAAJ |via=Google Books |access-date=December 7, 2020}} Such statements were formalized as the Hurricane Local Statement following the advent of the Automation of Field Operations and Services (AFOS) within the National Weather Service in 1978.{{cite web |title=Automation of Field Operations and Services (AFOS) National Weather Service (NWS) Service Records and Retention System (SRRS) Data |url=https://data.noaa.gov/dataset/dataset/automation-of-field-operations-and-services-afos-national-weather-service-nws-service-records-a |website=NOAA Data Catalog |publisher=NOAA |access-date=December 7, 2020}}{{cite book |title=AFOS Handbook 5 |date=September 1, 1985 |publisher=National Weather Service |page=B7 |volume=8 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=YIDtT6ND9LIC |via=Google Books |access-date=December 7, 2020 |chapter=Appendix B}} Within the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System, HLS was initially composed of two components: an automated section providing meteorological information using the National Digital Forecast Database (also known as a TCV) and a tailored section with input from the local Weather Forecast Office describing potential impacts. In 1999, the Weather Forecast Office in Melbourne, Florida, began accompanying the HLS with a suite of graphics known as a graphical HLS (gHLS).{{cite conference|last1=Feltgen |first1=Dennis |last2=Devanas |first2=A |title=Video Hurricane Local Statement |url=https://ams.confex.com/ams/Annual2005/techprogram/paper_88251.htm |access-date=December 7, 2020 |conference=21st International Conference on Interactive Information Processing Systems (IIPS) for Meteorology, Oceanography, and Hydrology |date=January 12, 2005}}{{cite CiteSeerX |last1=Deese |first1=Jason T. |last2=Paxton |first2=Charles H. |title=Utilization of the GFE in Severe Weather Recognition at the Tampa Bay Area National Weather Service |date=August 2002|citeseerx=10.1.1.630.4840 }} In 2009, the National Weather Service made this graphical product available for all Weather Forecast Offices along the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean.

The original HLS format was often criticized for being unwieldy. In its service assessment following Hurricane Andrew in 1992, the National Weather Service found the HLS to be too long, redundant, and constrained by the timing of the National Hurricane Center's products.{{cite web |title=Hurricane Andrew: South Florida and Louisiana August 23-26, 1992 |url=https://www.weather.gov/media/publications/assessments/andrew.pdf |publisher=National Weather Service |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Silver Spring, Maryland |date=November 1993}} During Hurricane Irene in 2011, forecast offices in the Mid-Atlantic states and Northeastern U.S. criticized the HLS for its excessive length and broad scope.{{rp|33}} On average, there was a one-hour gap between the issuance of the TCV segment and the remainder of the HLS among the 12 Weather Forecast Offices impacted by Irene.{{rp|46}} Forecasters were also forced to debug the software responsible for issuing the statement as events unfolded.{{rp|37}} The National Weather Service later proposed that the automated and human-driven components of the HLS be issued as two separate products as part of a broader effort to improve the readability, timing, and usefulness of the product.{{cite web |title=Summary of Hurricane Local Statement Social Science Products |url=https://coast.noaa.gov/data/digitalcoast/pdf/hls-summary-report.pdf |publisher=NOAA Coastal Services Center |access-date=December 7, 2020 |date=April 2014}}{{cite web |last1=Goldsmith |first1=Barry S. |last2=Sharp |first2=David W. |last3=Santos |first3=Pablo |last4=Ricks |first4=Robert J. Jr. |last5=Moreland |first5=Matthew J. |title=From the "Statement Heard Around the World" to Hurricane Threats and Impacts: The Evolution of Communication Potential Impacts and Safety Messages Since Katrina |url=https://www.weather.gov/media/bro/research/pdf/J8.4StatementHeardRoundWorld_KatrinaSymp_manuscript.pdf |publisher=National Weather Service |access-date=December 7, 2020 |location=Brownsville, Texas }} This proposal came to fruition in 2015, scaling back the HLS to a summary product and separating it from the TCV.