COLUMBIA, S.C. — The Global Forecast System (GFS), also known as the American model, received some major upgrades this week that will help the computer model better forecast weather across the United States.
Dr. Louis Uccellini, director of the National Weather Service, announced the changes in a press conference Monday.
One of the biggest changes with the model is the coupling of the GFS with a global wave model called WaveWatchIII, consolidating atmospheric and wave forecast data and distributing them together.
These upgrades will help double the vertical resolution of the model, which will go from 64 vertical slices to 127. Other upgrades include improved hurricane forecasting, modeling for snowfall events, heavy precipitation forecasts, and overall model performance.
“All in our efforts to fulfill our mission of saving lives and mitigating property loss," Uccellini said.
The National Weather Service has been testing this model upgrade internally for over a year. When testing this update in 2019, the new version of the GFS was more accurate in forecasting Hurricane Dorian’s northward turn along the Florida coast compared to the operational GFS at the time. This more accurate forecast gave 36 hours of extra lead time according to the National Weather Service.
People often compare the American model to the European model during hurricane season to see which will outperform the other. The upgrades to the GFS are expected to help it more accurately forecast major weather events and better compete with other global models.
Dr. Uccellini is optimistic about the future of forecasting in the United States.
“These advancements not only provide better accuracy and resolution of the models but also sets the stage for the future upgrades and are a big step towards advancing NOAA’s operational global forecasting capabilities.”