New group of IMETs deployed to Australia

I have written recently, on December 30th and January 13th, about the deployment of NWS Incident Meteorologists (aka IMETs) to Australia to help the Australian Bureau of Meteorology provide fire weather forecasts. The are deployed in six week cycles through early March 202. The first group of IMETs has or will soon be returning home. IMETs work as forecasters in NWS Forecast Offices when they are not deployed to fires. Thanks to the NWS Forecast Office for sharing your forecasters with Australia and for filling in the gaps to while one of your forecasters is gone. Thanks to the returning IMETs for your service, you were away from your families and friends, and I suspect you made new friends.

There is a new group of IMETs that has been or soon will be deployed to Australia where they will work with the Australian Bureau of Meteorology in three different offices (Sydney, Brisbane, and Melbourne. See the graphic below. The graphic below represents IMETs have have been or are scheduled to be deployed to Australia.

Obtained from NWS IMET FB January 22nd post on January 28, 2020

Thank-you to:

• Patrick Gilchrist (NWS Glassgow) deployed to Brisbane
• Mark Struthwolf (NWS Salt Lake City), Mark Pellerito (NWS Binghamton) and Joe Goudsward (NWS Little Rock) deployed to Sydney
• Carl Cerniglia (NWS Tuscon), Terry Lebo (NWS Wilmington NC) and Todd Carter (NWS Spokane) deployed to Melbourne
• Deployments pending as of January 22nd: John Franks (NWS Wilmington, OH) and Heath Hockenberry (NIFC Boise ID)

There have been a couple of nice media reports on the work of the NWS IMETs featuring Todd Carter from the NWS Spokane, both include video reports: KQHQ6 (January 22nd) and KXLY (January 24th).

I am so very proud of our IMETs, you honor your country with your service.