 Today, we'll be using an application called Slido, and through this application, you're able to join in the conversation, ask us some questions, and also participate in some polls. So you might see that we'll have a word cloud that's up on the application. So if you scroll down the page, you'll notice what I'm talking about. So go ahead and answer, put in a word. For what word do you think of, or feelings do you have when you hear the word hurricane? I see dangerous, need to prepare, having restrictions, wind, powerful, COVID is a topic that is up in everybody's mind right now, danger, large, storm, when, where, how bad. Thank you for participating. And today we are talking with Dr. Rebecca Morse, and we also have two of my coworkers helping me with this program, Daniel Zitlo is a visual media specialist, and we also have Paul Martinez, who's our technician, who, if you've been to the NCAR Mesa lab, you may have seen him run up and help us with the microphones every once in a while. There's going to be a couple of questions that you can also interact with. One of them is we're actually wondering where are you turning, tuning in from. So whenever you get a chance, if you could just let us know where are you coming from, that's kind of cool because it's virtual and it's live. So NCAR is the National Center for Atmospheric Research, which is a world-leading organization dedicated to the study of the atmosphere, the air system, and the sun. And I coordinate these lectures typically in person, but we're all today coming to you from our own homes. And we're really excited because we miss you. So hopefully once you guys get to come back to the Mesa lab, we'll get to see you in person. And if you like this event, we're hoping to continue some live presentations so that we can continue reaching a broader audience in this way. Today we're talking with Dr. Rebecca Morse, who is a senior scientist in the NCAR's Mesa Scale Microscale and Meteorology Laboratory, which we typically call M-Cubed. She has interdisciplinary expertise in weather forecasting, systems, and risk communication, with an emphasis on high-impact weather, including hurricane forecasts and tornadoes and floods. Her research focuses on the communication and interpretation of hazardous weather risks, the use of weather-related information in decision-making, and weather hazard prediction and predictability. She has served on multiple national and international leadership roles, including on several U.S. national academies, committees, and as an elected counselor of the American Meteorological Society. Dr. Morse received her BA from the University of Chicago and Ph.D. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. And because this is an encore, we have a lecture archive that you can see through our Explore series. And I'll turn it over to Dr. Morse so she can tell us a little bit about what is the type of work that she does. And if you weren't able to watch the archive lecture, you're always welcome to after this show program. But she can also tell us a little bit about what are those topics that you covered. So Dr. Rebecca Morse, you got the stage. Thank you. Thank you, Lorena. And thank you for everyone who's joining in. And this is the first time I've done this, and I think the end part has done this, so it's very exciting to hear people tuning in. I had a lot of fun doing my live lecture a couple of summers ago, and so it's great to have the opportunity to talk with people and to answer questions. So I'm a research scientist as a career for my Ph.D. studies. I studied weather prediction and weather prediction modeling, how good forecasts can be and how to best improve them. And my work still looks at that as well as how do we communicate forecast information, how can we communicate it better, and how can we help people make better decisions when they are threatened by events like hurricanes. So in my lecture, I talked about how weather forecasts, including hurricane forecasts, have improved dramatically over the last 100 years or so and the last 50 years. If you think back on the hurricanes that happened, you know, even 40 or 50 years ago, much less 100 years ago, the scale of the forecast was much less and people had much less information and much less time to prepare, and there were really devastating situations. But as we know, there are still hurricanes that cause a lot of dramatic loss of life and misery, and so the forecast can still be improved, and especially the communication of those forecasts can be improved, given all the ways that we have to communicate information today that we didn't have even five or 10 years ago, much less 50 years ago. So that's what my research focus is on, and that's what my lecture focused on, and I'm happy to answer questions about any topics that interest you related to hurricanes or other things. Great. Thank you, Rebecca. And one of the cool things about Slido is that when you scroll down, you'll see a question that was asked, and there's a little thumbs up and a little thumbs down. If you are also interested in a question that was previously asked, you can hit the thumbs up and that will upvote our questions. So we'll have kind of like a question that most people are interested in. And if we don't get to answer your questions today, we'll do our best to meet with Rebecca and answer those questions. So if you register through Eventbrite, we can definitely send you an email that way. So, Dan, would you be able to share with us what is a question that has been asked, and then we'll pop it up on the screen so everybody can see it. So two people are asking, where do you see the field of hurricane forecasting in the next 10 years? Yeah, that's a great question. I mean, there's a lot of development happening now in several areas. One is with the modeling that is the computer modeling that improves the forecast. So there's a lot of improvements in the modeling, particularly in being able to forecast the details of the hazards that people may experience. So for example, the storm surge flooding that they may experience or the high winds, the forecasting is really improving in terms of being able to highlight which areas are likely to experience those different hazards. There's a lot of advances in terms of the observations. So the satellite data, data from airplanes and other kinds of information that can come in and be used to improve the forecast. And there's new kind of small drone-like platforms that can fly through hurricanes and so on. Because of course it's dangerous to fly through a hurricane and demand a few people on it. So the drone provides additional opportunities. So those are some of the advances also that computing technology is always advancing and new algorithms for checking useful information from the observations of the models. And then an area that I work in that's related to forecasting is really all the ways that we can communicate information nowadays. So there's just huge advances in terms of things like being able to do interactive communication with users. So 20 years ago, a forecaster would give information and they would have to wait until someone called them or something else to hear back. But nowadays, you can do things like see real time on Twitter or social media, how people or other ways on the internet, how people are thinking about the storm, what information they're getting, are there ways that they're misunderstanding the risks and then adjust the communication that way. So those are some of the advances and a lot of them are based on the technology that's advancing, that's able to be used for wonderful forecasting, as well as the science and all the amazing scientific advances that scientists are working on to understand hurricanes better and use that information to improve the forecast. The other thing I didn't mention was longer lead time forecast. So now the National Hurricane Center issues forecast five days in advance up to the landfall. You can't access forecast information earlier from other sources and the hurricane center is experimentally trying out with longer range forecast and just to kind of get a sense of the accuracy and how they can communicate that information in a way that doesn't make people to misunderstand the risk because the forecast is so uncertain in the week out, but really advancing the lead time of the forecast and being able to alert people earlier. I can see how technology has such a great impact or the potential to have a large impact on reaching a larger community. Now we have social media, we have internet and I mean in your talk from 2018 you mentioned how people had to call each other and it was a lot of word of mouth. So we still use word of mouth now, but it's amazing to see how technology has advanced and what it will hold in the future. So let's see what other question do we have and the upvotes that we got. So this question got six votes and it says uncertainty has a very specific meaning in science and it doesn't mean a scientist is unsure. How do you communicate that nuance to the public? That's a great question and it's a really active discussion in the meteorological community and the forecasting community has been since the start of my career. So forecasts are inherently uncertain and that goes back to the early days of weather forecasting as well as chaos theory and some other work by other friends that helps you understand what the uncertainties are and how they evolve as the forecast evolves. There's a famous quote that people sometimes criticize. If you get some dollars, I'm still probably from the 80s about the known known, the known unknowns and the unknown unknowns. So I think when meteorologists think about uncertainty, they think about the known unknown. So what can they say, for example, when a hurricane is approaching, they can say, okay, this is the different possible tracks we think might happen. We don't know exactly which one it will take, but we think it's going to go in these directions and this is the possible intensities. It's not that they don't know anything. They just know certain things that could possibly happen, different kinds of scenarios and that's kind of the known unknowns. I think this question talked about sometimes numbers of the public treat the uncertainty as the scientist being unsure, which is sort of like the unknown unknowns if you don't know anything. But actually there's a lot of techniques and meteorology and other kinds of scientific fields to estimate the uncertainties and to be able to say with some accuracy what you can say and what you can then kind of what the different possible scenarios are. So that's how scientists think about uncertainty. There's definitely a big communication gap and there's a lot of work in the meteorological community to figure out how to be able to communicate in a quick and understandable manner. These are some of the possibilities you might prepare for, but also still sound authoritative and express knowledge. I think we're all experiencing this with the COVID situation where there's a rapidly evolving, highly uncertain risk. The challenges in communicating those complex risks in ways that people can understand and use. So it's a challenge in a lot of fields. And I'd love to hear if people in the audience have ideas about how we could improve the communication of uncertainty. That would be great. One area that people are talking about now is communicating certainty as well. So saying we do know this. We do know that's a big hurricane. We do know it's approaching the US. We don't know exactly where it's going to make landfall, but it's a big storm. So if it does, it's going to be a devastating storm. It might have a lot of storm surge with it and so on. So sometimes there are things that you can say with some certainty. And that's one area of emphasis. But it's a complicated situation given that there's a lot of different kind of things happening with the storm as well as it's evolving. So there's a lot of new information coming out all the time and that intersects with the uncertainty of the information is actually changing. And when there's changing information, sometimes there's old information still out there and people might think that's uncertainty because the forecast is changing because it's getting better and more precise as the storm approaches. Yeah. And I remember from your talk, you actually had some cones of uncertainty, some figures, spaghetti, pasta, hurricane tracks. Yeah. And our next question actually follows up on what you just were talking about. So let's take a look. So five people were interested in this question. And the question says, what kind of language is most effective when communicating potentially dangerous weather to the general public? Thank you, Caitlin, for asking that question. So that's a great question. That's actually the topic of a lot of my research is what kind of language is most effective. And the general answer is it depends on the person you're talking with. So different people interpret information different ways based on where actually, again, this is another great example where seniors now with COVID how different people interpret the same information about their risk very differently based on their worldviews, based on their politics, based on their situation, based on things like their job status, how it affects what they do, their family, those kinds of things. And so different language works for different people. And so it's a challenge for groups that are trying to communicate the risk to be able to communicate in a way that is effective for a lot of people. So in the risk communication literature, there's a couple of different ways that people think about communicating risk. One is to communicate that something bad might happen. And you can communicate that in a way that's more scientific, like saying there's a 90% chance that this will happen. Or you can communicate it using language that makes people fearful or anxious. And those are two different ways that you can try to motivate people to take protective action. Another important thing is to communicate in a way that less people know about what they can do to protect themselves. So if people hear about a really dangerous hurricane coming and it might devastate their home and they don't have the resources to evacuate, then they can really shut down because they don't think there's anything they can do about it. So it's also important to think about how to communicate about what people can do to protect themselves knowing all the complex situations that people are in. So there is some evidence, some of our own research and other people that suggest that some messages, for example, during one of the hurricanes we studied, Hurricane Ike, there was a message at the National Weather Service issue that said people who live in certain areas may face certain death if they don't evacuate. That was because people weren't evacuating and they were so concerned about the storm surge. And some people really responded to that and said, it really scared me and it convinced me I really need to evacuate. And some people heard that and said, it really scared me and it convinced me I'm not going to evacuate because I'm going to prove them wrong. So people can really respond to the same message differently and you have to think about communicating with different audiences. Thank you. Yeah. And I'm actually interested. There was a poll that we're going to put up about, Dan, if you can put up the poll with the question about what do you think like causes the most deaths during a hurricane. And if you scroll down the page, it'll give me an opportunity to answer. There's whether or not it was heart attack or if it's storm surge or if it's strong winds, rainfall, flooding. What is the leading cause of death from hurricanes in the U.S.? Or at least what do you think is the leading cause? So everyone's picking the same answer. Yeah. A lot of people are picking storm surge flooding. Okay. And there's a pretty cool app. I'll send it via Eventbrite that the UCAR comment program has about storm surge. And in the app, if you download it, you can actually check out how flooded would your home be in a storm surge. So I'll share that video, the Eventbrite email list. Sweet. So, Rebecca, what is the leading cause of death during hurricanes? Good question. And most people got right that storm surge. If you look at there have been some studies that have calculated the deaths from hurricanes and storm surge flooding is the leading cause of death. If you think about direct deaths, so number of deaths that occur when a hurricane makes landfall, it's much more difficult to calculate the deaths that occur for other reasons. For example, people do die in hard attacks preparing for the storm, heating up afterwards, electrocution, their issues with hospitals losing power. There's a lot of indirect deaths that are also can be important. And a lot of it really depends on which storms you look at. So, of course, probably most of you remember Hurricane Maria and what happened in Puerto Rico and all of the deaths there, a lot of which were really difficult to count and to attribute to different causes. A lot of them were really in the aftermath of the storm. And then also for Hurricane Katrina, it was a similar situation that there were more deaths than usual due to other kinds of circumstances related. There wouldn't have happened without the storm, but they were related to kind of the aftermath of what happened. And it's difficult to attribute those deaths. So because those two storms in the recent, in the last 20 years or so are the ones with the most deaths, a lot of it really depends on how you count what happened with those deaths. For example, when the dams broke in Katrina and people were flooded, was that storm surge, was that another kind of flooding when the deaths happened in the hospitals afterwards and so on. So it's a complicated, complicated question. But from my perspective, all of those things, all of those ways that people die in hurricanes are important because for all of them, there are ways that people can try to protect themselves and try to reduce their risk of loss of life. Great. Thank you for answering that question. And thank you, everybody, for participating in the poll. We, I'm interested in another question that has been voted up. And let's take a look at what that question is. The question says, with the plethora of apps out there, are you finding that non meteorologists are becoming overwhelmed with mixed messages? And this is a question from Gordon. Thank you for asking that. Yeah, that's a great question as well. And it's one of the things that we study a lot. There's a lot of concern among the meteorologists that people are getting confused about the messages. And there definitely is a lot of information out there and it can be hard to sort out how reliable the information is, as well as how recent the information is. So as this film approaches, the information gets better. And sometimes when you're looking at an app, you don't know necessarily if you're relying on information that six hours older, 24 hours older, so on. But the way I look at it is that's the way the world is nowadays, that we all get lots of information from lots of different sources. If you go back before there were apps, say, 20, 30 years ago, people would talk about, say, they would go to the grocery store to gather supplies and they would hear people, well, not 20, 30 years ago, but they would hear people talking on their cell phones or they would see people talking about the storm. So they were always getting informal information from other people. They were just hearing more from their friends and family and so on. And now it's just exploded as far as all of the kinds of different information you can get. So the way I look at it is that's just the way the world is. People are really used to looking to all kinds of different information sources to get information and from getting information from lots of informal sources or from preferred sources in certain situations. And so the question is that you can't really stop that from happening. What scientists can do and forecasters and meteorologists can do is try to make sure that they're injecting the best information possible that disseminates out of the system and that if they do see a situation where misinformation is going out because of certain apps or certain non meteorologists communicated something sometimes not even purposefully that turned out not to be accurate, it was old information. So they can see where the kind of discussion is heading so they can make sure to try to say, no, actually, this is what you really need to worry about. So I think a lot of it is for scientists and forecasters and meteorologists really adapting to the way things are now and the way that the way the way that people communicate is really different and it changes really fast. So if you find a solution now probably in a year, everyone's going to be on a different communication mechanism and using different kinds of information. So you really have to keep up with it. Yeah, we never know what the new app is going to be in the next popular one, right? So it's great that you guys are keeping up to date and doing a lot of research on that, how to communicate. And let's take a last question and let's see which one was up voted from Jay or Diane. Are there any resources to help scientists with science communication? Yes, there are. There's all kinds of resources. There are books, there are trainings, there are, you know, people that help scientists communicate. There's all kinds of things, there's opportunities for scientists like me to participate in venues like this where we get to practice and, you know, hone how we communicate. I think one of the challenges that I find is a lot of scientists tend to be introverts and so there are some scientists who really love to go out and communicate with the public, but a lot of scientists aren't naturally kind of don't naturally lean towards doing that. And so it's sort of an uncomfortable thing. It's also not, we don't think of it as our top skills that is communicating. And so, so not as many scientists or someone's involved in communication as might be, but I think with a lot of things or lots of ways you can learn about it. But really the most important thing is to practice and get feedback and to just try things out. And so that's why I agree to do this question and answer today because it's a great opportunity for me to hear what different people are thinking about and to practice communication and use some of the things that I've learned in the various trainings that I've done. But it's definitely an increasing emphasis for scientists is to learn more about communication and in some programs for undergraduates and graduate students now, that's something they actually formally teach them as opposed to, so when I went to school, you just learned the science. If you were going to learn to communicate, it was sort of like that after that. So there's a lot more emphasis now on making sure to train scientists, more scientists to be able to communicate effectively. That's so great to know that people can go into this field and communicate science with and work with scientists to do this type of research. And can you leave us with a final set of words for anybody who is interested in venturing into this field? What is something you wish you would have been told before like your younger self, I guess? Yeah, I actually had known how many scientists there aren't out there studying all kinds of really cool things. When I was a child, I was really interested in weather, but it never occurred to me that anyone would ever study that. I didn't even know about the existence of things like stormtroopers. It was before the movie Crister and before the internet. So that there are scientists studying all kinds of really cool things and that there's places to go to learn from those people and also that you can try different things and see what you like. So when I was younger, I thought you picked a career and then you did it. But what I've learned is that you can try something for a summer or for a few years and say, wow, I like this part about it. This part we can make favorite. And how can I move in that direction? And you can also, as you progress through your career, you get to stages where you say, wow, what I was doing 10 years ago isn't what I want to do anymore. But by saying you can kind of try out different things and careers are very fluid. But I really encourage people to find something they're passionate about and find the right people who are really interested in that. And that makes for a great experience as a student or as a career because if you're really interested, then it's really worth putting in the work to learn about it and to have that career. That's so great. And I look forward to seeing who the next scientists are that we'll be speaking with. And thank you so much, everybody, for participating. Thank you, Rebecca Morris. Thank you, Dan Zilow. Thank you, Paul, Martinez. And for all of you for participating in our questions, I know you are participating in asking us questions. I know there's a lot more questions that were asked than the time allowed. So we'll work on trying to like make an email and Rebecca, if you would be so kind to answer some of those questions, we could send them out to our participants. Thank you, Lorena. Thank you, Paul, and Daniel, and everyone for joining us today. And our next event will actually take place on May 20th. You might see a poster in the background of my screen. This is a rescheduled event from March 11th and 14th. We'll be doing an online lecture with Slido again so you can ask some questions. And I hope to see some of you there. The Eventbrite page actually went live, starting at 7 today, so you can definitely register and we'll be sending out the live webcast link once again through email. Thank you, everybody, and I hope you stay safe. I hope your family stays safe. And once everything kind of starts to open back up, we look forward to seeing you live in person. Talk to you soon.