Weather Forecasting

The ability of the National Weather Service to accurately forecast severe weather has consequences for every American. Hundreds of lives and billions of dollars are lost every year to thunderstorms and lightning, tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards, and floods. During the past 10 years, the National Weather Service has been modernizing its systems so that it can more accurately and quickly predict severe weather. Efficiencies gained from these systems will also allow a 50-percent reduction in the existing number of field offices and a 17-percent cut in overall staffing levels. More than 90 percent of the costs for this modernization and restructuring--nearly $4.2 billion--are for acquiring four automated systems: the Next Generation Weather Radar, the Next Generation Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite, the Automated Surface Observing System, and the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System. Each of these systems is at a different stage of completion. Initially, the estimated cost of the systems through deployment was pegged at under $2 billion, with deployment to be completed through the end of October 1994. The latest cost estimates for the systems, however, have doubled, and deployment of the systems is not scheduled until 1998--almost four years later. National Weather Service officials attribute the cost growth and deployment delays primarily to expanded system requirements, an increased number of units to meet other agency needs, development problems, and inflation.

GAO found that: (1) the Next Generation Weather Radar's (NEXRAD) project cost estimate increased over $1.1 billion, from the original 1980 estimate of $340 million to approximately $1.5 billion; (2) delays in the NEXRAD schedule will extend its final implementation from fiscal year (FY) 1989 to 1996; (3) the Next Generation Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES-Next) cost estimate increased more than $1.3 billion, to approximately $2 billion; (4) the first scheduled launch for the GOES-Next satellite was delayed by more than 4 years, to February 1994, and the second satellite has been planned for launch about 1 year later; (5) the GOES-Next system's cost growth and schedule slippage were due to the complexity of the satellite design, inadequate program management, and poor contractor performance; (6) it will cost $120 million to deploy 250 Automated Surface Observing Systems (ASOS), a $48-million increase over the 1986 estimate of $72 million; (7) deployment of ASOS has been extended by approximately 5 years, to FY 1995; (8) the Advanced Weather Interactive Processing System (AWIPS) will cost $465 million to deploy, $115 million more than was estimated in FY 1986; (9) delays in the AWIPS schedule will extend final deployment to FY 1998, about 4 years beyond the original schedule; and (10) under the NWS restructuring plan, 249 field offices will be consolidated to 115 forecast offices, and 13 river centers will be collocated with those offices.