(March 27, 2007) - Working in collaboration with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers: Fort Worth District, National Weather Service Southern Region headquarters staff hosted the third annual Interagency Water Resource Meeting. This year's theme was interagency communication and coordination during high impact water resource events (floods, droughts) in the Corp's Southeast Division service area -- including Texas, Oklahoma and portions of Arkansas and southern Missouri.

Meeting at the Fritz G. Lanham Federal Building in Fort Worth, Texas; representatives from the West Gulf, Arkansas Red Basin and Lower Mississippi River Forecast Centers were also on hand, as well as water resource managers from the U.S. Geological Survey and the Bureau of Reclamation.

Each agency provided updates on current and future water resource activities/projects that relate to their agency missions. Ben Weiger, chief of the Southern Region Hydrologic Services Branch, facilitated the National Weather Service portion of the agenda which focused on current/future hydrometeorological services and advances in hydrologic science and technology.

Topics included products and services of the future, updates on the Advanced Hydrologic Prediction Service and National Digital Forecast Database, a low Water Project in the Upper Trinity River Basin, a new flash flood guidance technique, short-term probabilistic hydrologic forecasts and updates on information technology data sharing and consolidation. The last topic has become a major issue for all water resource agencies due to homeland security concerns, demands for stronger IT security compliance and continuity of operation activities. Among other things, the meeting was designed to foster a better understanding of the data sharing and system compatibility issues and activities of each agency.

U.S. Geological Survey attendees also gave presentations on their efforts to "harden" stream gages to withstand the forces of nature and the deployment of mobile storm surge sensors during Hurricane Rita. A Lower Mississippi River Forecast Center presentation featured backup operations during Hurricane Katrina. Participants also discussed best practices and opportunities for improvement prior, during and after high impact water resource events - including a recommendation to exchange and routinely update water resource agency emergency-related contact information.