Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment Request; Tornado Watch/Warning Post-Event Evaluation, 37181 [2024-09801]

Agencies

• DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE
• National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

[Federal Register Volume 89, Number 88 (Monday, May 6, 2024)]
[Notices]
[Page 37181]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2024-09801]


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DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission to the 
Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for Review and Approval; Comment 
Request; Tornado Watch/Warning Post-Event Evaluation

    The Department of Commerce will submit the following information 
collection request to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for 
review and clearance in accordance with the Paperwork Reduction Act of 
1995, on or after the date of publication of this notice. We invite the 
general public and other Federal agencies to comment on proposed, and 
continuing information collections, which helps us assess the impact of 
our information collection requirements and minimize the public's 
reporting burden. Public comments were previously requested via the 
Federal Register on February 9th, 2024 during a 60-day comment period. 
This notice allows for an additional 30 days for public comments.
    Agency: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Commerce.
    Title: Tornado Watch/Warning Post-Event Evaluation.
    OMB Control Number: 0648-0797.
    Form Number(s): None.
    Type of Request: Regular submission: revision.
    Number of Respondents: Surveys: 1,200, Interviews: 50.
    Average Hours per Response: Surveys: 5-10 minutes, Interviews: 15-
30 minutes.
    Total Annual Burden Hours: Survey: 200 hours, Interviews: 25 hours.
    Needs and Uses: Each year over 1000 tornadoes affect communities 
across the United States, yet little is known about how individuals 
receive, interpret, and respond to information from NOAA relating to 
this hazard. In fact, only a small sample of tornadoes ever receive 
study, and most often those are only the most violent tornadoes. No 
generalizable, or even relatively large-scale information on tornado 
forecast and warning response after real-world events exists. The NOAA 
National Weather Service (NWS) and National Severe Storms Laboratory 
(NSSL) designed the data collection instrument to allow for more 
routine collection of this information. Respondents include members of 
the United States public who have been in or near a tornado, received a 
tornado warning, or were in or near a strong storm that made them 
concerned about tornadoes. They answer questions about the ways they 
received, understood, and responded to information about the event, 
including NWS watch and warning information. This survey is delivered 
through a web application hosted by NSSL called Tornado Tales, 
available online at https://inside.nssl.noaa.gov/tornado-tales/.
    After approval of our initial data collection instrument (that 
shown on the website), the OU Cooperative Institute for Severe and 
High-Impact Weather Research and Operations (CIWRO) and NOAA NSSL 
Behavioral Insights Unit carried out post-event data collections for 
multiple tornado events, validating the questions and identifying 
issues for improvement. This fieldwork led to several needed 
improvements, including the addition of questions about the event more 
broadly, changing some response types, rephrasing some questions that 
were interpreted too broadly, and including questions about efficacy 
and the availability of forecast information to individuals. While the 
revisions have added questions to the survey, their improved clarity 
should allow for faster response times per question. We estimate the 
time to complete the survey is five to ten minutes on average. Subject 
recruitment will primarily be done by NOAA NSSL and its partners 
advertising the survey via websites and social media outlets. In 
addition to these efforts, there is also the possibility that during 
post-storm damage assessment activities NWS forecasters may direct 
impacted individuals to the Tornado Tales website.
    In addition to the changes to the survey instrument, researchers at 
NOAA NSSL and at the OU CIWRO Behavioral Insights Unit would like to 
conduct interviews with emergency managers, broadcast meteorologists, 
and members of the public after certain tornado events. These more in-
depth interviews will collect similar information to the survey 
instrument from members of the public, broadcast meteorologists, and 
Emergency Management personnel who recently experienced a tornado 
event. The interviews will walk respondents through a timeline of 
events leading up to the tornado event. Researchers will use a skip-
logic approach, meaning participants will only answer questions about 
the time periods relevant to their personal experience. The purpose of 
these interviews will be to more thoroughly explore how residents, 
broadcast meteorologists, and Emergency Managers received, understood, 
and responded to tornado forecasts and warnings. Given the in-person 
nature of these interviews, we expect them to take between 15 and 30 
minutes on average.
    Affected Public: Individuals or households.
    Frequency: On occasion.
    Respondent's Obligation: Voluntary.
    Legal Authority: N/A.
    This information collection request may be viewed at 
www.reginfo.gov. Follow the instructions to view the Department of 
Commerce collections currently under review by OMB.
    Written comments and recommendations for the proposed information 
collection should be submitted within 30 days of the publication of 
this notice on the following website www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain. 
Find this particular information collection by selecting ``Currently 
under 30-day Review--Open for Public Comments'' or by using the search 
function and entering either the title of the collection or the OMB 
Control Number 0648-0797.

Sheleen Dumas,
Department PRA Clearance Officer, Office of the Under Secretary for 
Economic Affairs, Commerce Department.
[FR Doc. 2024-09801 Filed 5-3-24; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 3510-KE-P