Thunderstorms

This course contains the supplementary assessment materials requires to obtain the Regional Severe Thunderstorm Warning qualification.

There is still an in person assessment to be completed alongside the content of this course to be able to achieve completion of the course.

In completing this course you will receive the Regional Severe Thunderstorm Warning qualification. 

You will be enrolled in this course by your assessor once your assessment date has been set.

Overview

This training module has been developed to provide training and guidance on the convective analysis process for forecasters all across Australia. The module provides instructional materials, including demonstration videos, on the process of performing a convective analysis and the key fields and convective parameters by which to do this. It also includes practice exercises to test your knowledge gained on the 4 main topics. The overall learning section of the course, inclusive of all instructional material and time to complete exercises, holds approximately 5 hours of content, though no one piece of instructional material is any longer than 20 minutes.

It aligns with the Severe Thunderstorm competency performance criteria covering convective analysis so forecasters are trained in accordance with the skills required for producing a convective outlook and can obtain the Thunderstorm Forecasting qualification. The assessment required to be completed to obtain the qualification involves completing two quizzes which takes a total of 3.5 hours to complete.

The course has been developed in partnership with the Extreme Weather Desk to ensure a nationally consistent and best practice approach. 

Learning Outcomes

This course covers the following broad learning outcomes linked to each section:

1. Complete an analysis of the current convective environment
2. Complete a Basic Thunderstorm Assessment
3. Complete a Thunderstorm Mode Assessment
4. Complete a Severe Phenomena Assessment

These are then broken down into mores detailed outcomes in each section.

Course Outcome

To complete the course you must complete the assessment which involves completing two quizzes and the outcome of this is gaining the Thunderstorm Forecasting qualification.

Assumed Knowledge

It is assumed that you have knowledge of the Thunderstorms subject from the graduate meteorologist course as this course does not delve into the theory of thunderstorms, but focuses on the application of the theory to forecasting. It is also assumes you have familiarity with operational systems and products in the thunderstorms area.

This is an introductory course into the warning software TIFS which is used to produce severe thunderstorm and severe weather warnings.

There are 5 demonstration videos that cover the TIFS interface and layout, how to issue a state severe thunderstorm warning, how to issue a cell based severe thunderstorm warning, how to issue a severe weather warning and how to cancel all of these warnings.

Note: The original videos are based on version 9 of TIFS (released 2016) but there is now an update page about the most recent release, version 11, which includes the short demo video, which should bring you up to speed with some of the latest and crucial changes.

These videos are only introductory so the establishment and improvement in skill with TIFS will require working through case studies or more on the job practice.