LAWRS

LAWRS defined - A facility where observations are taken, prepared, and transmitted by NWS certified FAA control tower personnel or Flight Service station personnel on a limited basis to support aviation requirements.

The Lake Charles hydromet staff monitors a total of four LAWRS sites. They are Beaumont/Port Arthur, New Iberia, Lafayette, and Alexandria (International). All the sites use ASOS (Automated Surface Observing System). We are tasked to monitor observations from these sites to ensure they enter the NWS database. These observations are then quality controlled to make sure all required elements are in the observation and are correct. If any elements are in error, these sites are contacted to fix the error. If elements are missing, then the observer will augment that element of the observation.

In situations where elements are missing due to outages or communications have failed or are failing, we are tasked to notify AOMC (ASOS Operations and Monitoring Center).

Besides the LAWRS sites, we also monitor two unmanned sites, one at Salt Point and the other at Esler Field near Alexandria, plus our very own system here at Lake Charles.