John C. "Chris" Broyles is an American

meteorologist A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmosphere of Earth, atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists ...

who is a

weather forecaster A meteorologist is a scientist who studies and works in the field of meteorology aiming to understand or predict Earth's atmospheric phenomena including the weather. Those who study meteorological phenomena are meteorologists in research, while t ...

and

tornado A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with the surface of Earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. It is often referred to as a twister, whirlwind or cyclone, although the ...

forecasting expert with the

Storm Prediction Center The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) is a US government agency that is part of the National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP), operating under the control of the National Weather Service (NWS), which in turn is part of the National Oceani ...

Education

Broyles attended St. Edwards University in

Texas Texas ( , ; or ) is the most populous U.S. state, state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. It borders Louisiana to the east, Arkansas to the northeast, Oklahoma to the north, New Mexico to the we ...

, before transferring to the

University of Northern Colorado The University of Northern Colorado (UNCO or UNC) is a public university in Greeley, Colorado, United States. It was founded in 1889 as the State Normal School of Colorado and has a long history in teacher education. The institution has offi ...

, where he graduated with bachelor's degrees in

meteorology Meteorology is the scientific study of the Earth's atmosphere and short-term atmospheric phenomena (i.e. weather), with a focus on weather forecasting. It has applications in the military, aviation, energy production, transport, agricultur ...

and

journalism Journalism is the production and distribution of reports on the interaction of events, facts, ideas, and people that are the "news of the day" and that informs society to at least some degree of accuracy. The word, a noun, applies to the journ ...

Career

In 1994, Broyles was hired as an intern at the

National Weather Service The National Weather Service (NWS) is an Government agency, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that is tasked with providing weather forecasts, warnings of hazardous weather, and other weathe ...

(NWS) office in

Jackson, Kentucky Jackson is a home rule-class city in and the county seat of Breathitt County, Kentucky, in the United States. The population was 2,231 according to the 2010 U.S. census. It was the home of the Jackson Academy, which became Lees College. H ...

. Following his internship, Broyles was hired as a forecaster at the NWS office in

Aberdeen, South Dakota Aberdeen () is a city in and the county seat of Brown County, South Dakota, United States. As of the 2020 census, its population was 28,495. making it the third-most populous city in the state. Aberdeen is home of Northern State University. ...

. In 2003, Broyles was hired at the

(SPC) at the

National Weather Center The National Weather Center (NWC), on the campus of the University of Oklahoma, is a confederation of federal, state, and academic organizations that work together to better understand events that take place in Earth's atmosphere over a wide rang ...

Norman, Oklahoma Norman () is the List of municipalities in Oklahoma, 3rd most populous city in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, with a population of 128,026 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. It is the most populous city and the county seat of Clevel ...

as a forecaster. Throughout his career forecasting at the SPC, Broyles issued 14 High Risk Outlooks, with 11 verifications. On April 7, 2006, Broyles issued the first-ever Day-2 High Risk Outlook, in preparation for the

tornado outbreak of April 6–8, 2006 The tornado outbreak of April 6–8, 2006, was a major tornado outbreak in the Central United States, central and parts of the southern United States that began on April 6, 2006, in the Great Plains and continued until April 8 in South Carolin ...

. This High Risk also included a 60% chance of tornadoes, including at least some becoming significant. Following verification of this High Risk, the

United States Department of Commerce The United States Department of Commerce (DOC) is an executive department of the U.S. federal government. It is responsible for gathering data for business and governmental decision making, establishing industrial standards, catalyzing econ ...

awarded Broyles with a Silver Medal. On April 14, 2012, Broyles issued the second-ever Day-2 High Risk Outlook, while forecasting for the

tornado outbreak of April 13–16, 2012 From April 13 to 16, 2012, a major tornado outbreak occurred across a large portion of the Great Plains. The storms resulted in six tornado-related fatalities, all of which occurred as a result of a nighttime EF3 tornado that caused major damage ...

Publications

Throughout his career, Broyles has authored and co-authored several

academic papers Academic publishing is the subfield of publishing which distributes academic research and scholarship. Most academic work is published in academic journal articles, books or theses. The part of academic written output that is not formally publis ...

and

case studies A case study is an in-depth, detailed examination of a particular case (or cases) within a real-world context. For example, case studies in medicine may focus on an individual patient or ailment; case studies in business might cover a particular fi ...

. Besides academic publications, Broyles led a team of twenty others to create the

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA ) is an American scientific and regulatory agency charged with Weather forecasting, forecasting weather, monitoring oceanic and atmospheric conditions, Hydrography, charting the seas, ...

's Violent Tornado webpage, which documented more than 200 tornado outbreaks throughout the United States' history. *''Forecasting tornado location across the Dakotas and Minnesota'' in 1998. *''The role of synoptic patterns and temperature and moisture distribution in determining the locations of strong and violent tornado episodes in the north central United States: A preliminary examination'' in 2000. *''The Effect of a Low-Level Boundary on the Development of the Panhandle, TX Tornadic Storm on 29 May 2001'' in 2002. *''Synoptic and mesoscale characteristics associated with violent tornadoes across separate geographic regions of the United States'': ''Part 1 – low-level characteristics'' & ''Part 2 – upper-level characteristics'' in 2002. *''Radar characteristics of violent tornadic storms using the NSSL algorithms across separate geographic regions of the United States'' in 2002. *''An Iterative Storm Segmentation and Classification Algorithm for Convection-Allowing Models and Gridded Radar Analyses'' in 2022. *The OMEGA (Outlook Machine Assembling Algorithm) Project in 2022.

References

Living people American meteorologists National Weather Service people Year of birth missing (living people) {{Meteorology-stub