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Effective Tuesday, October 2, 2012, at 700 AM CDT or 1200 Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), the NWS Weather Forecast Office (WFO) in Mobile, AL will reconfigure its current marine zones for the Mobile/Pensacola area. This reconfiguration will provide better forecast services by realigning the coastal zones for climatological, geographical, and bathymetric effects.

This change will provide enhanced forecasts for Mobile Bay, the Mississippi Sound, Perdido Bay, Pensacola Bay, including the Santa Rosa Sound, and Choctawhatchee Bay.

All current zones will be maintained, except GMZ630 (Mobile Bay), which will be divided into two zones (one for North Mobile Bay and one for South Mobile Bay) split using a line between the mouth of the Fowl River eastward to Point Clear. In addition to a new zone for Mobile Bay, four additional new zones will be added, including one for Perdido Bay, which will incorporate Wolf Bay into the zone.

Table 1 lists all the products issued by WFO Mobile that will be affected by the marine zone changes.

Table 2 lists all the current marine zones and universal Geographic codes UGCs for WFO Mobile.

Table 3 lists all the marine zones and UGCs for which WFO Mobile will issue forecasts and warnings effective October 2, 2012.

WFO Mobile's Current Marine Zones Click to Enlarge

Table 2: Current marine zones and corresponding Universal Geographic Codes (UGC) for WFO Mobile. CURRENT MARINE ZONE NAME UGC Mobile Bay GMZ630 Coastal Waters from Pensacola FL to Pascagoula MS out 20 NM GMZ650 Coastal Waters from Destin FL to Pensacola FL out 20 NM GMZ655 Waters from Pensacola FL to Pascagoula MS from 20 to 60 NM GMZ670 Waters from Destin FL to Pensacola FL from 20 to 60 NM GMZ675

WFO Mobile's New Marine Zones Click to Enlarge

Table 3: Marine zones and corresponding UGCs for which WFO Mobile will issue forecasts and warnings effective October 2, 2012. MARINE ZONE NAME UGC North Mobile Bay GMZ630 South Mobile Bay GMZ631 Mississippi Sound GMZ632 Perdido Bay Area GMZ633 Pensacola Bay Area including Santa Rosa Sound GMZ634 Choctawhatchee Bay GMZ635 Coastal Waters from Pensacola FL to Pascagoula MS out 20 NM GMZ650 Coastal Waters from Destin FL to Pensacola FL out 20 NM GMZ655 Waters from Pensacola FL to Pascagoula MS from 20 to 60 NM GMZ670 Waters from Destin FL to Pensacola FL from 20 to 60 NM GMZ675 New Marine Zones in KML format

Customers must reprogram affected hardware and software to continue processing the products in Table 1.

An updated zone map shapefile containing the new boundaries for these marine zones is available for download from the following website:

http://www.nws.noaa.gov/geodata/catalog/wsom/html/marinezones.htm

For questions about these changes, please contact: