Use and perception of weather forecast information across Europe

Abstract

AbstractAlthough European studies have become more common in recent years, published research on perception and use of weather information has been dominated by studies from the United States with some scattered contributions across Europe. The present study gives a broad European context, by providing perspectives from 18 countries and several user professions as well as from 14 National Meteorological and Hydrological Services (NMHSs), and by combining new insights from probabilistic forecasting, warning and interaction between NMHSs and their users. These insights are based on two surveys undertaken in the framework of the EUMETNET Nowcasting (E‐NWC) Programme, where EUMETNET represents the European Meteorological Services' Network: one survey for the participating NMHSs in the E‐NWC Programme, and the other one for their respective users. Both surveys were distributed in autumn 2019, and open for responses until spring 2020. Several findings from the surveys support conclusions of previous research, for example, concerning the perception of probabilities or taking measures in case of severe weather (many users would start their preliminary measures at a probability level of 60%). Although most of the NMHSs and their users are in regular contact, there is room for increasing the frequency of face‐to‐face meetings between them. Nearly one‐third of NMHSs never meet face‐to‐face with users from the public. The two surveys indicate that there might be benefits of increased collaboration and sharing of data between European NMHSs to be able to offer their users more training, and to learn from each other in areas where insight already exists.