10 – 15 December 2016 / Pretoria, South Africa (South African Weather Service facilities)
The course on Operational Marine Surface Analysis using EUMETSAT‘s Copernicus Marine Data Stream (CMDS) has now been run on two occasions. The course consists of an online phase (three weeks) and a face-to-face phase (four days). So far, the face-to-face phase of the course has successfully taken place in Supetar (Croatia) and in Pretoria (South Africa).
The aim of the course is to support professionals with expertise in marine surface analysis in the use of EUMETSAT‘s CMDS. The course covers the following competencies:
- Continually monitor and analyse the marine weather situation
- Warn of hazardous marine meteorological phenomena
The face-to-face phase chiefly consisted of hands-on practical sessions — working with both past case study data and live current data, and, on the final day, participants presented a short case study demonstrating some of the skills they learnt on the course.
During the delivery of the face-to-face phase we received invaluable assistance from staff from NOAA and KNMI, who brought considerable expertise in scatterometer and altimeter data to the course.