Tobagonians learn about weather warnings

The TT Meteorological Service (TTMS) intends to build resilience to high-impact hydro-meteorological events by strengthening hydro-meteorological and early warning services in the Caribbean,

On Tuesday and Wednesday, the TTMS Marine Meteorological Services hosted a workshop in collaboration with the Caribbean Meteorological Organisation (CMO) and supported by the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) and the Climate Risk Early warning Systems (CREWS) Caribbean Initiative. On Tuesday, the Tobago leg was held at the Magdalena Beach and Golf Resort, while the second leg on Wednesday was held in Trinidad.

Speaking on Tuesday, Met Office assistant director Arlene Aaron-Morrison thanked the WMO and the CMO for the major role they played.

“The Met Service is responsible for providing forecasts of sea conditions and early warning of impending hydro-meteorological hazards including rough seas and swell events for TT. Marine meteorological service is an emerging and important priority for the Met Service under the umbrella of disaster-risk reduction and early warning systems. As a result, we are currently in the process of improving our marine and ocean meteorological services capacity.”

She said through the workshop, the Met Service will gain a better understanding of the needs of maritime communities, which will inform the development of user-oriented marine meteorological products and services.

Technical co-ordinator of the WMO Member Services Regional Office of the Americas Barbara Tapia said she was satisfied with the planned event, in the important domain of the provision of marine meteorological services for coastal and offshore regions in TT.

“The general framework of the planned activities is the CREWS Caribbean project titled Strengthening Hydro-Meteorological and Early Warning Services in the Caribbean," she explained. The project is funded through the Climate Risk and Early Warning Initiative (CREWS) and implemented through the World Bank Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery, by the WMO as well as-UNDR (United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction).

The main objective, she said is to create interactions for the benefit of the population in Tobago, through an exchange between community members and other marine stakeholders on the island, which will make the communication of marine weather forecasts more useful and efficient.

“Therefore, this workshop will be interactive and collaborative, divided into two parts. The first part will focus on end-users’ perception of marine weather forecast communication needs. The second part will focus on service delivery of the TTMS.”

She said the workshop will reinforce the knowledge on user needs and consequently define activities to adapt the service provision to the needs of the relevant target group.

“We cannot forget that a large part of the population of TT and the Caribbean depends on marine resources for their livelihoods.”