Draft talk:List of particularly dangerous situation watches

A few words of caution
The IEM archive ONLY goes back to 2006. There are records of the SPC issuing PDS watches more than two decades prior to that (since 1982). If you happen to know where you can find PDS watch records prior to 2006, please either post them here or cite the list. 12.74.221.43 (talk) 23:11, 20 May 2024 (UTC)

Flash Flood Watches?
I want to inform you that the particularly dangerous situation phrase was only used by certain NWS offices (mainly the Memphis one) and the Flash Flood Watch itself was largely deprecated in 2021 (it was consolidated into a Flood Watch except in cases of dam/levee failures, heavy rain over burn scars, or other non-rainfall related floods) 12.74.221.43 (talk) 23:15, 20 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Furthermore; Flash Flood Watches were NEVER issued by the Storm Prediction Center (unlike severe thunderstorm and tornado watches) 12.74.221.43 (talk) 23:16, 20 May 2024 (UTC)
 * That’s fine. They should still be included as they are PDS watches issued by the National Weather Service, which is what this list is for. SPC is a branch of the National Weather Service and obviously, if a NWS office issued a watch with the wording, that is also a watch issued by the National Weather Service. The opening sentence is “This is a list of "particularly dangerous situation" (PDS) watches issued by the National Weather Service.” That wording right there suits the usage for the lists. The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 18:17, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

Preliminary Lists
Moved the years into subsections. 174.171.152.215 (talk) 20:52, 25 May 2024 (UTC)

2019
Will start a preliminary list of PDS watches for 2019 here… this for reference to editors such as @WeatherWriter and @TornadoInformation12 and @MemeGod27. 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:17, 21 May 2024 (UTC)


 * Three PDS Severe Thunderstorm Watches in ‘19.
 * August 11
 * July 19
 * June 15
 * 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:18, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Four PDS Tornado Watches in ‘19
 * Twice on May 20
 * Twice on May 22
 * 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:19, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

2018
Continuing my reference list to all who may concern. There were two PDS Tornado Watches in 2018. One on March 19; the other on April 13. 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:21, 21 May 2024 (UTC)


 * There were NO Severe Thunderstorm Watches that were PDS tagged in 2018. 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:22, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

2017
In keeping with tradition here. Listing watches by year on the talk page to assist with editors.

There were a boat load of watches in 2017. Eleven if I’m not mistaken. I’m going to list them in reverse chronological order.

12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:29, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
 * June 12 (tornado)
 * May 27 (severe thunderstorm)
 * Twice on May 18 (both of them tornado)
 * May 16 (tornado)
 * April 5 (tornado)
 * April 2 (tornado)
 * And last but not least; FOUR times on January 22 (all of which were tornado watches).

2016
There were two PDS watches in 2016. Both of them were tornado watches. One on February 23; the other on April 26. 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:30, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

2015
There were also two PDS watches in 2015. One Tornado Watch and the other a Severe Thunderstorm Watch.


 * The Tornado Watch was on December 23.

12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:31, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
 * The Severe Thunderstorm Watch was on June 20.


 * I will list additional years once we list the watches between 2015 and 2019. 12.74.221.43 (talk) 19:33, 21 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I’ve went ahead and listed 2014 since I’m already to 2018 in terms of at least listing the dates. West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 22:58, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

2014
I am in the process of making a preliminary list for the year 2014. West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 22:53, 8 June 2024 (UTC)


 * There were five PDS watches in 2014. All but one were Tornado Watches.
 * The lone Severe Thunderstorm Watch was on June 30.
 * The Tornado Watches were as follows in chronological order: one on June 16; two on April 28; and one on April 27.
 * West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 22:55, 8 June 2024 (UTC)

Graphics
@WeatherWriter: I added the graphics per the precedent set at List of Storm Prediction Center high risk days and List of Storm Prediction Center meso-gamma mesoscale discussions, and I still think they should be included, but perhaps I implemented it poorly. If you feel like it would help the text we could always set a graphic size and column width smaller than what I set. Ks0stm (T•C•G•E) 06:38, 22 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm ok with images, but even then, the text portion is squished so much. Would it be better to remove the text entirely and just use the image instead? The Weather Event Writer (Talk Page) 22:15, 22 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Partial oppose: the text itself conveys a lot of information about date of occurrence and the maximum rating of the tornadoes and the worst of the winds. I would be okay with removing the “Watch for…” section though to give more room for the graphics. But NOT every single column. 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:9C2B:BE3A:2C62:10D2 (talk) 13:20, 23 May 2024 (UTC)
 * In other words, I would be okay with trading the “Watch for…” section for a graphics section; since the Watch for… section seems rather redundant. 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:9C2B:BE3A:2C62:10D2 (talk) 13:23, 23 May 2024 (UTC)
 * The only exception to that being for Flash Flood Watches, since there isn’t any graphic produced. I think the “Watch for…” section may be able to stay there; since Flash Flood Watches can be issued for a variety of reasons. But on that section, a column on the maximum observed rainfall during the event might be necessary., 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:9C2B:BE3A:2C62:10D2 (talk) 13:25, 23 May 2024 (UTC).
 * pinging anyone who is even potentially remotely close to this article. Can someone please fix the graphics. I don’t know how to render them smaller and they’re way too big. I would do it myself but I don’t know how. 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:842E:D85C:F39B:604A (talk) 15:28, 25 May 2024 (UTC)
 * For the image size, just keep clicking on the image within the cell within the visual editor. Under the "Advanced" tab, the size can be adjusted. For source editing, refer to the format of List of Storm Prediction Center meso-gamma mesoscale discussions. 174.171.152.215 (talk) 20:48, 25 May 2024 (UTC)
 * For users who can actually upload images onto the draft, use this link format for uploading the gifs:
 * " https://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/watch/ [year]/ww[Watch#]_overview_big.gif"
 * Example: https://www.spc.noaa.gov/products/watch/2024/ww0189_overview_big.gif 174.171.152.215 (talk) 20:45, 25 May 2024 (UTC)
 * IP, I can’t upload images without going through WP:FFU. I am also an IP. 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:98A4:5503:A222:FE57 (talk) 00:56, 26 May 2024 (UTC)
 * can you or someone else put up the rest of the watch graphics please? 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:5D80:9ADE:8F4:56F2 (talk) 01:37, 27 May 2024 (UTC)
 * Never mind; I’ll just wait four days and be autoconfirmed. (Ps. Same editor who’s been editing as IP for several months) West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 00:32, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

"Watch for..."
Since each hazard for each PDS watch is divided into 3 separate sentences on the SPC website (a tornado hazard, a wind hazard, and a hail hazard), should "Watch for..." be split into 3 columns for these threats (for PDS tornado watches and PDS severe thunderstorm watches)? It could clear up the slight differences between each entry (and establish a clear order of which hazards are listed in). 174.171.152.215 (talk) 15:38, 24 May 2024 (UTC)


 * I think that section should be replaced with the graphic that used to be on here (see section above for more details) for Severe Thunderstorm Watches and Tornado Watches. And maybe leave it for Flash Flood Watches. 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:842E:D85C:F39B:604A (talk) 19:36, 24 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I have removed that section from Tornado Watches and Severe Thunderstorm Watches. 2601:5C5:4380:FD80:842E:D85C:F39B:604A (talk) 19:44, 24 May 2024 (UTC)
 * I made those two replies back before I registered. West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 23:55, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

Maximum tornado rating/wind gust/hail size
From the looks of it, it seems the maximum tornado rating etc is given by the maximum recorded event that happened on that day. Since this is a list of watches, though, it should probably only apply to the highest tornado and maximum wind gust/hail size that occurred within the watch area. This would make things harder to parse out. I might ask the SPC if KMZ or shapefiles for the watches are available. TornadoLGS (talk) 21:50, 9 June 2024 (UTC)


 * I think there are KMZ’s for at least the watch box outline are available from the SPC. If you’re looking for the counties, I’m pretty sure the IEM has ‘em too. West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 23:52, 9 June 2024 (UTC)

How should we handle PDS watches with archival issues being present?
I wanted to bring this discussion here, since archives for watches being stored only seem to go back to 2004, with PDS tornado watches having been issued since April 2, 1982. My personal idea for this is that there should be something mentioned in the article that record keeping for watches started in 2004, while the earliest PDS watch was issued in April 1982, listing that one as the earliest in the table, then listing the rest that are actually archived within the record keeping. Bringing this discussion here for other ideas for what should be done and how to handle this archive issue.  Chris Wx  🌀 ( talk -  contribs ) 20:00, 11 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I think the high-risk day article was similar for a while. TornadoLGS (talk) 20:06, 11 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I didn’t know that. West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 20:07, 11 June 2024 (UTC)
 * I agree though. Maybe publish it once our current existing archives have been completely gone through and we get the list completed back to 2004. West Virginia WXeditor (talk) 17:46, 13 June 2024 (UTC)