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WeatherBug(R) Community Safety Solution to Keep Broward County Schools Safe from Severe Weather and Lightning Threats via Desktop and Mobile Phone Alerts; WeatherBug Relays the Most Severe Weather Alerts in U.S. to Protect Property and Lives.


FORT LAUDERDALE Fort Lauderdale (lô`dərdāl), residential, commercial, and resort city (1990 pop. 149,377), seat of Broward co., SE Fla., on the Atlantic coast; settled around a fort built (c.1837) in the Seminole War, inc. 1911. , Fla. & GERMANTOWN, Md. -- WeatherBug(R), the leading provider of live, local weather information services See Information Systems. , and the Broward County School Board, today announced that at the Broward County School Board April 18th meeting they will be demonstrating a new initiative to proactively alert and notify key school personnel of imminent severe weather and lightning threats in their area. WeatherBug's Community Safety Solution will deliver severe weather alerts and prediction notifications to online applications in the schools and at the School District's Safety Department. Alerts will also be relayed via cell phones and PDAs to school personnel within the area to protect students outdoors on playgrounds, playing fields or anywhere they are exposed to the elements, such as field trips.

"Too often people wait too long before seeking safe shelter from a thunderstorm thunderstorm, violent, local atmospheric disturbance accompanied by lightning, thunder, and heavy rain, often by strong gusts of wind, and sometimes by hail.  and find themselves caught outside in a very dangerous and sometimes deadly situation," said John Jensenius, a lightning safety For lightning-related injuries, see .
Thunderstorms are the primary source of lightning. Because people have been struck many miles away from a storm, seeking immediate and effective shelter when thunderstorms approach is an important part of lightning safety.
 expert with the NOAA NOAA
abbr.
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

Noun 1. NOAA - an agency in the Department of Commerce that maps the oceans and conserves their living resources; predicts changes to the earth's environment;
 National Weather Service.

Severe weather approaches quickly, and many times without warning. The WeatherBug Community Safety Solution will deliver the information to schools, via desktop applications and mobile phones, in time to move students to safety when severe weather threatens, before it is too late. Working with the Broward County Sheriff's office and Emergency Management office over the past year, WeatherBug has installed more than 55 WeatherBug Tracking Stations across Broward County on public safety facilities and 20 local schools. Each station reports live neighborhood-level weather conditions to millions in the county. With the new safety package, school personnel will receive the following safety alerting and prediction alerts on their mobile phones:
--  Lightning Prediction

--  Lighting Strike Alerts

--  Weather Alerts

    --  Temperature

    --  Heat Index

    --  Winds and Wind Gusts

--  National Weather Service Severe Weather Warnings


"WeatherBug was founded to deliver the most precise local weather information and severe weather alerts to help protect lives and property," said Robert Marshall The following people have the name Robert Marshall:
  • Bob Marshall (wilderness activist), wilderness activist, the first Adirondack 46er
  • Robert Marshall (basketball coach), former basketball coach at the University of Richmond
  • Robert Marshall (Manitoba politician)
, WeatherBug President and CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. . "As severe weather is becoming more frequent across the U.S., WeatherBug is the only company who has the data, technology and experience to deliver live instantaneous in·stan·ta·ne·ous  
adj.
1. Occurring or completed without perceptible delay: Relief was instantaneous.

2.
 conditions and alerts where people actually work, play, live and attend school. We are dedicated to working with The School Board of Broward County over the next few months to roll out the WeatherBug Community Safety program. Educating and protecting children is our priority and our passion."

The new program unfolds in three phases:

Phase One begins with the District's Safety Department and Broward County Schools. WeatherBug's Enterprise solution, WeatherBug Streamer, will be installed at the District's Safety Department. This application, accessed via the Internet Internet

Publicly accessible computer network connecting many smaller networks from around the world. It grew out of a U.S. Defense Department program called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), established in 1969 with connections between computers at the
, will deliver live weather conditions across the county, including lightning prediction and strike data, plus enhanced radar imaging. In addition, all schools will be given a 10 license version of WeatherBug's premium desktop application WeatherBug Plus. Teachers and principals will be able to receive live weather conditions from the school's closest WeatherBug Tracking Station, or any of the 8,000 stations across the U.S., on the desktop along with severe weather alerts. This phase will be completed by the end of May.

Phase Two adds Location Based System (LBS (Location-Based Services) See mobile positioning. ) Alerting. Location based alerting on cell phones and PDAs will be rolled out to deliver safety alerts and prediction alerting. In addition, parameter (1) Any value passed to a program by the user or by another program in order to customize the program for a particular purpose. A parameter may be anything; for example, a file name, a coordinate, a range of values, a money amount or a code of some kind.  setting for certain thresholds can be set for alerting (i.e. if the wind speed exceeds 20 MPH MPH Master of Public Health.
MPH Master's Degree in Public Health
) as well as custom text messages to the team with the phones to enhance communication. Four phones will be licensed per school. This phase will be completed by the opening of the 2006 School Year.

Phase Three involves extensive, on-site user training. WeatherBug Meteorologists Atmospheric scientists
  • Cleveland Abbe
  • Ernest Agee ...smells
  • Aristotle
  • Gary M. Barnes
  • David Bates
  • Francis Beaufort
  • Tor Bergeron
  • Jacob Bjerknes
  • Vilhelm Bjerknes
  • Howard B.
 and technicians will ensure Broward schools fully grasp and maximize the program. This phase will be completed with Phase Two at the opening of the 2006 school year.

"The safety of Broward county students is our number one priority," said Jerry Graziose, Broward County School Board, Safety Director. "We are proactively planning and instituting systems and processes to protect our faculty and students from severe weather threats. The state of Florida averages 10 deaths and 40 injuries due to lightning in Florida each year, and half occur during recreational activities, and that is tragic."

People need reliable weather data relevant to their location in time to prevent unnecessary accidents and death. WeatherBug is often the only weather source that can provide truly live local weather information at the neighborhood level with its network of over 8,000 WeatherBug Tracking Stations across the U.S. (Alternative sources are typically based upon computer modeling from airport data, which can be up to an hour old.)

About WeatherBug

WeatherBug (www.weatherbug.com) ensures that individuals, schools, businesses and government agencies receive the most precise live weather information, the most relevant weather reports, and the earliest weather warnings to safeguard property, lives and to plan with confidence. With 8,000 WeatherBug Tracking Stations and over 1,000 cameras primarily based at neighborhood schools and public safety facilities across the U.S., WeatherBug maintains the largest exclusive weather network in the world. The live local weather conditions are delivered to millions of consumers via the Internet and mobile devices, more than 100 state and local government agencies including the National Weather Service, and to broadcast television stations, schools, and businesses. WeatherBug data is unique as it is the only live, neighborhood weather available anywhere. WeatherBug is a brand of AWS AWS Amazon Web Services
AWS American Welding Society
AWS Advanced Warning System
AWS Advanced Wireless Services
AWS Automatic Weather Station
AWS Alien Workshop (skateboard company)
AWS Austria Wirtschaftsservice GmbH
 Convergence Technologies, Inc. (www.aws.com)

Editors Note: Alyce Menton Menton (mäNtôN`), town (1990 pop. 29,474), Alpes-Maritime dept., SE France, near the Italian border and on the Mediterranean Sea. A popular resort of the Riviera, it was a part of Monaco until 1848 when it declared itself a free city under  will be on-site in Broward County for the announcement, issued at the Broward County School Board April 18th meeting. Contact her to schedule interviews or for additional information.
COPYRIGHT 2006 Business Wire
No portion of this article can be reproduced without the express written permission from the copyright holder.
Copyright 2006, Gale Group. All rights reserved. Gale Group is a Thomson Corporation Company.

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Publication:Business Wire
Date:Apr 12, 2006
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