1. 2008 AT540 Forecast Contest! Compete against your classmates and TA for bragging rights and a chance to win extra points on your final lab grade! Apply the forecasting tools learned in class to real forecasting situations Learn more about Fort Collins weather, what drives it and what are the difficulties in forecasting it

2. Contest Schedule You will be forecasting for Fort Collins on every Tuesday/Thursday that we hold AT540 class. Forecasts are due at 5:00pm You will forecast for the 48-hour period beginning at 7pm MST the day the forecast is submitted... If you fail to enter a forecast you receive the climatological average values for that day (try to avoid this)‏ There is no course grade penalty for missing forecasts but submitting them is considered mandatory  If you miss more than 2 we will have to consider a grade penalty But on the bright side, the winner will receive +1 on their lab grade and second place receives +0.5 points!

3. Say you are forecasting today (Tuesday):  Day 1: Tuesday 7pm MST to Wednesday 7pm MST  Day 2: Wednesday 7pm MST to Thursday 7pm MST

4. Forecast elements Your forecast will consist of maximum and minimum temperatures and 24-hour accumulated liquid-equivalent precipitation for both Day 1 and Day 2 Temps in degrees F Precip is forecasted based on categories: 0: no precipitation – trace 1: 0.01” - 0.09” (inclusive)‏ 2: 0.10” - 0.24” 3: 0.25” - 0.49” 4: 0.50” - 0.99” 5: >= 1.00”

5. Scoring You are assessed 1 error point for each degree difference between your forecasted temperatures and the observed temperatures You are assessed 4 error points for every precipitation category your forecast is off from the observed Total error points are tallied and the forecaster with the least amount of points wins (like golf)‏

6. Submitting your forecasts rams.atmos.colostate.edu/dsward/AT540/login.php  Also a link to this site from the AT540 homepage Your login name is your last name (first letter capitalized!)‏ Password is the first two letters of your first name and the first two letters of your last name (all lowercase)‏ The rest is relatively self-explanatory, just remember to get them in by 5:00pm!

7. Other players Climo – average high, low, precip for the particular day in question Consensus – The average of all human forecasts (typically does quite well)‏ NWS – You never know what you're going to get from the weather service NAM, GFS MOS

8. Verification and results Results will be posted on the contest website as soon as they are available At the end of the semester I will put together a more complete analysis of the results with graphs and things The forecasts are verified with the 7pm observations from the CSU campus coop site  If necessary, the CSU campus data-logger numbers will be used  If both the data-logger and human observer fail for some reason, KFNL data are used

9. Helpful websites How to read the MOS:  http://www.nws.noaa.gov/mdl/synop/metcard.php http://www.nws.noaa.gov/mdl/synop/metcard.php Meteograms (model forecast time series)‏  http://www.nws.noaa.gov/mdl/gfslamp/meteoform.php http://www.nws.noaa.gov/mdl/gfslamp/meteoform.php Grid interpolations:  Detailed model output including upper air forecasts and convective parameters  http://www.wxcaster.com/models_text.htm