Public View - Interagency Remote Automatic Weather Stations (RAWS)

<div style='box-sizing:border-box; font-family:Roboto, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Arial, sans-serif;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box;'><h1 style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:0.5rem; font-weight:500; font-family:&quot;Roboto Condensed&quot;, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Arial, sans-serif;'><span style='box-sizing:border-box; background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);'><font color='#000000' size='4'>Remote Automatic Weather Stations (RAWS)</font></span></h1></div></div><div style='box-sizing:border-box; font-family:Roboto, &quot;Helvetica Neue&quot;, Arial, sans-serif;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:10px;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box; display:flex; margin-right:-15px; margin-left:-15px;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box; width:960px; padding-right:15px; padding-left:15px; max-width:75%;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box; clear:both;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box;'><div style='box-sizing:border-box;'><p style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:1rem;'><font color='#000000' size='4' style='background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);'>There are nearly 2,200 interagency Remote Automatic Weather Stations (RAWS) strategically located throughout the United States. RAWS are self-contained, portable, and permanent, solar powered weather stations that provide timely local weather data used primarily in fire management. These stations monitor the weather and provide weather data that assists land management agencies with a variety of projects such as monitoring air quality, rating fire danger, and providing information for research applications. </font></p><p style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:1rem;'><font color='#000000' size='4' style='background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);'>Most of the stations owned by the wildland fire agencies are placed in locations where they can monitor fire danger. RAWS units collect, store, and forward data to a computer system at the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in Boise, Idaho, via the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite (GOES). The GOES is operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (<a href='https://www.goes.noaa.gov/' target='_blank' rel='nofollow ugc noopener noreferrer'>NOAA</a>). The data is automatically forwarded to several other computer systems including the Weather Information Management System (WIMS) and the Western Regional Climate Center (<a href='https://wrcc.dri.edu/' target='_blank' rel='nofollow ugc noopener noreferrer'>WRCC</a>) in Reno, Nevada. </font></p><p style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:1rem;'><font color='#000000' size='4' style='background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);'>Fire managers use this data to predict fire behavior and monitor fuels; resource managers use the data to monitor environmental conditions. Locations of RAWS stations can be searched online courtesy of the Western Regional Climate Center. </font></p><p style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:1rem;'><font color='#000000' size='4' style='background-color:rgb(255, 255, 255);'><br /></font></p><p style='box-sizing:border-box; margin-top:0px; margin-bottom:1rem; color:rgb(0, 0, 0);'><span style='box-sizing:border-box; font-weight:bolder;'><font size='4'>Facts about RAWS: </font></span></p><ul><li><span style='color:rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size:large;'>Weather data collected by RAWS, such as relative humidity, wind speed, wind direction, air temperature, fuel moisture and temperature, rain, and solar radiation are critical to predicting fire behavior, which is imperative to effective fire management of all kinds (suppression, prescribed burning, AMR, etc.).</span></li><li><span style='color:rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size:large;'>The BLM Remote Sensing Unit maintains about 1,700 RAWS units annually. </span><br /></li><li><span style='color:rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size:large;'>Stations run on a 12-volt battery combined with a 20-watt solar panel. </span><br /></li><li><span style='color:rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size:large;'>RAWS units costs approximately $18,000 to purchase. </span><br /></li><li><span style='color:rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size:large;'>The program has 75 portable units, Incident Remote Automatic Weather Stations (IRAWS) that can be deployed to any incident to augment on-site forecasts.</span></li><li><span style='color:rgb(0, 0, 0); font-size:large;'>IRAWS can be tone activated, meaning a firefighter can key a tone on their handheld radio to hear current weather data. </span><br /></li></ul><div><font color='#000000' size='4'>Learn more about RAWS </font><a href='https://raws.nifc.gov/' target='_blank' rel='nofollow ugc noopener noreferrer'><font size='4'>here</font></a><font color='#000000' size='4'>...</font></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div>