Amador County – The National Weather Service in Sacramento and Amador County Sheriff’s Office of Emergency Services will be conducting Weather Spotter Training for Amador County residents on Thursday, Dec. 15.

The training enables adults to become volunteers for “Project Skywarn,” which helps keep local communities safe by providing timely and accurate reports of severe weather to the National Weather Service. The training is free.

Amador County OES said: “Storm spotters play a valuable role in the severe weather warning process. The National Weather Service relies on visual observations from spotters to provide critical information that would otherwise not be available to forecasters. Spotter reports are combined with data from Doppler radar and satellite pictures to provide a complete understanding of severe storms and their impact on the public.”

The training starts “with a review of severe weather safety tips and severe weather operations at the National Weather Service. Basic storm spotter training will include visual indicators of strong winds, hail, tornadoes, lightning, fire weather, flooding and thunderstorm formation.”

The Weather Service will demonstrate how “reports are used in the weather warning process and identify some critical elements” spotters need to know. The presentation will discuss the forecast process and how volunteers help “issue the best possible warnings to protect the public from severe weather.”

Training will help attendees learn about severe weather experienced in the area. “The development of storms will be discussed, along with visual clues which may indicate the weather is about to turn severe,” OES said. Instructors “will also go over safety tips to allow citizens to be well-prepared for the occurrence of storms” and communication of weather reports to the National Weather Service will be explained. Spotter reports will help Amador County be better prepared when severe weather occurs.

Spotter guides, cloud charts and severe weather pamphlets will be provided to potential new weather spotters.

The training is set for 6:30-8:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 15 at the Amador County Administration Building in Jackson. For more information or to RSVP, contact Amador Sheriff’s OES at (209)223-6384 or email to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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