Paul Fox-Hughes from the Bureau of Meteorology presenting a talk on extreme weather at a Fire Behaviour and Fuels Conference workshop.
The Extreme Weather Research Advisory Forum, held at the Department of Fire & Emergency Services WA on 30 July, looked at the impact of extreme weather within the emergency management sector.
The research presented at this forum focused on the improved ability to understand, predict, forecast and monitor severe and high impact weather. Understanding the threat posed to communities is critical for emergency service agencies as it informs appropriate warnings and mitigation actions in the lead up to such weather.
The projects presenting at the Extreme Weather RAF covered:
Improving the scientific understanding of severe weather in Australia, such as cyclones, severe wind, thunderstorms, floods and fire weather
Improving the knowledge of how to best predict and forecast this severe weather, including model configuration and interpretation
Contributing to the post-event analysis and lessons learned from selected severe events that occur during the course of the project
Informing the development of numerical weather prediction systems specifically for severe weather
Development of a pilot capability to make useful predictions of community impacts of extreme weather and improving timely mitigation actions and integrating hazard forecasts with exposure and vulnerability data at the community level
Mitigation actions on critical infrastructure, buildings and homes
Managing impacts of cascading events.
Research projects that presented at this RAF were: