Regional Specialized Meteorological Center

A Regional Specialized Meteorological Centre (also Regional Specialized Meteorological Center and Regional Specialised Meteorological Centre; RSMC) is responsible for the distribution of information, advisories, and warnings regarding the specific program they have a part of, agreed by consensus at the World Meteorological Organization as part of the World Weather Watch.

As a result of the poor communications between countries following the Chernobyl disaster in the Spring of 1986, the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) was requested by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and other international organizations to arrange for early warning messages about nuclear accidents to be transmitted over the Global Telecommunications System (GTS). In addition some WMO member countries that lacked extensive forecasting capability requested that specialized pollutant transport and dispersion forecasts be provided during these emergencies. As a result, during 1989 Meteo-France (MF), Environment Canada (EC) and the United Kingdom's Met Office (UKMO) were all set up as RSMCs under interim arrangements between the WMO and the IAEA. Under these arrangements Meteo-France provided global coverage with the UKMO as the backup center until each WMO region had at least two RSMCs for transport model products. The need for the rationalization of transport and dispersion forecasts became even more apparent during the oil fire emergency after the Gulf War, when several organizations provided personnel on the ground with predictions of the smoke plume behaviour which were often misleading as there was no existing and well-recognized system to sort out the predictions from less experienced sources.

After it had successfully demonstrated its RSMC capabilities to the WMO's Commission for Basic Systems (CBS) during November 1992, the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration was made the fourth RSMC effective on July 1, 1993. This resulted in the WMO regions RA and RA IV having two RSMCs each which indicated the need to revise the interim arrangements. The new arrangements came into force in August 1994, with EC and NOAA responsible for the Americas, while MF and the UKMO covered the remaining parts of the World. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology was subsequently made an RSMC on July 1, 1995, while the Japan Meteorological Agency was made one in July 1997.

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