SRM

Got word that the icons were not, at all, displaying on the map.  Narrowed down the problem and it is now resolved.  Thanks to those that let me know.

Also had some crazy weather roll through the area here in Omaha as well.  Straigh-line winds up to 90MPH knocked down several trees and powerlines in my neighborhood.  Thankfully (as I type this) we have power, but tonight about 120,000 people are without power.  I have a feeling this could be something that lasts for a few days… We’ll see.

Stay tuned for some pics of the neighborhood and some other areas around town.

Someone had contacted me last week regarding some missing reports from 17 June.  The problem was that hail reports larger than 3″ were not showing up on the map.  The problem was not related to the actual report missing, rather, the icon for the larger hail reports was missing which will not allow the user to see the report.

Tuesday, 17 June, 2008 there were two reports of 4.5″ sized hail and a single report of 4.25″.  Now that the icons have been added, they should now show properly on the map.

Thanks to Jason Hunter for the heads up.

For those that are interested in Google Maps Mashups, I cannot recommend a better source than Mike Pegg’s GoogleMapsMania blog.  Mike initially covered my site when the blog was only 3 months old.  Since then his blog has grown exponentially and is now the source for Google Maps Mashups.

He talked about my site today with a great review and I want to ensure that others are aware of his fantastic site.

Update: Looks to be resolved.

If you’re curious why there are no reports showing up for June 7, 2008, it’s because for some reason the SPC Report file is empty.  It wasn’t like that a few hours ago and showed just over 250 reports.

For the time being, you can catch a map of the reports, albeit, with no data to go along with it.

Per the feedback I’ve received so far, I’ve changed the update frequency from 30 minutes down to 5.  You can see when the map was last updated by looking at the last update time stamp, found just to the left of the map.  If it’s more than 5 minutes out of date, refresh the map to see the latest reports.

Welcome back!

Yes, the site was in the dark ages for a couple years there, but we’re back with a new redesign as well as a few new features that should make the site a lot more interesting for our viewers.

Initially, you should notice the new design.  The site was re-designed for a few reasons.  First, the site was a little bit difficult to navigate and find your way around.  We’ve, hopefully, alleviated that by putting some of the most accessed aspects of the site, near the most important area — the map.

Above the map  and to the right, is our storm count for that day, as well as a broken out view for each type of report.  Additionally, by clicking the text links for each type, you can selectively view each type on its own.  To you left you should notice an input box to pull up past storm reports older than three days.  Clicking inside the input box should pop up a calendar that let’s you select the date visually rather than having to type it in manually.

Below the map are different layer options that you can turn on and off.  The convective outlook layer is provided through the Storm Prediction Center, while the radar and storm warnings layers are provided by the Iowa State Environmental Mesonet.

New map icons should help to better distinguish different storm types, as well as providing important report information without even having to click on the marker.  The Hail and Wind icons will show hail size and wind speed directly on the icon.

Daily storm reports are now updated every half hour rather than every hour, while previous day reports are updated every 6 hours.

With that, please let me know what your thoughts are on the new site design by either leaving a comment here or contacting me.