Bernard Meisner Received Prestigious Carnegie Mellon Award

(Nov. 1, 2005) - Dr. Bernard N. Meisner, deputy chief of the National Weather Service Southern Region Scientific Services Division, has been selected as a recipient of the 2005 Carnegie Mellon Alumni Merit Award. Selected by the Carnegie Mellon Alumni Association, Meisner is one of only six individuals nationwide to receive this prestigious honor. The award recognizes him for "exceptional accomplishment in his chosen profession, to which he has brought a degree of progress and has become a distinguished leader".

During the last three decades, Meisner has earned a reputation as an outstanding scientist, educator and innovative manager. As deputy chief of the Southern Region's Scientific Services Division, he is responsible for professional training, technological applications and collaboration with the academic community. His duties include providing training and technical support for nearly 1,000 meteorologists and hydrologists in 10 states, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.

He has also served on the faculty of the University of Texas at Austin, the University of Oklahoma and the University of St. Thomas in Houston. He has conducted research at the Joint Institute for Marine and Atmospheric Research in Honolulu, Hawaii; the National Weather Service's Climate Prediction Center in Washington, DC; and the USDA Forest Service's Forest Fire Laboratory in Riverside, Calif.

Meisner is the recipient of numerous National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and National Weather Service awards. With particular interest in tropical meteorology, fire weather, numerical weather prediction and applied climatology, he is the author of dozens of articles in scientific and professional publications. His work includes the reference paper on El Niño for the American Meteorological Society's Project DataStreme, a teacher enhancement program for grades K-12.

He was elected a Fellow and has been certified as a Consulting Meteorologist by the American Meteorological Society. He is also a member and past vice president of the National Weather Association and was honored as the NWA's Member of the Year in 2000 for his significant contributions to the Association.

Noting Meisner's expertise as an innovative leader in teletraining techniques, former NWS Southern Region Scientific Services Division Chief Dan Smith says, "Dr. Meisner continues to perfect this medium for technical and scientific training in the National Weather Service, and the process has played a major role in directing management decisions at the highest levels of the organization. He is frequently recognized for his contributions in this area, and for the quality of his work in enhancing the scientific basis for warnings and forecasts throughout the National Weather Service."

Meisner earned a bachelor's degree in physics and German from Carnegie Mellon University in 1971; and a master's degree (1976) and a doctorate (1978) in meteorology from the University of Hawaii.

The 2005 Alumni Merit Award was presented by Carnegie Mellon President Jared L. Cohon during a homecoming weekend ceremony on the University's campus in Pittsburgh, Penna., Oct. 28.