ShareThisMANILA — President Benigno S. Aquino III on Thursday proudly reported to the country that the weather forecasts and weather bulletins have greatly improved, enabling the citizens to be alert in cases of floods, landslides and when to avoid traveling by sea or air.
In his first 100 days report at the La Consolacion College in Mendiola, the President said that “intermittent rain showers across the country are now explicitly explained in details as to time and place so that the fishermen can avoid fishing then.”
The President said little is left to be invested in equipment, adding that the weather updates, done every six hours before, will now be every hour.
“We changed a lot at the Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration,” he said.
Similarly, the Department of Science and Technology assured the people that more real time weather updates is now a reality after it forged a co-location agreement with wireless communication giant, Smart Communications.
Science Secretary Mario Montejo said the DOST, through its weather forecasting arm, the Philippine Atmospheric Geophysical Astronomical Services Administration, signed on Monday an agreement with Smart initially covering 63 cell sites nationwide.
“The co-location of our telemetric gauges in Smart cell sites will complement our on-going program to strengthen the capacity of PAGASA in issuing weather forecasts and flood warnings to the public,” Montejo said.
Each telemetric rain gauge automatically sends rainfall data to PAGASA’s 44 Automatic Weather Stations in the form of short messaging system or SMS. The data are then posted real-time in PAGASA’s website [www.pagasa.dost.gov.ph] that is accessible to the public.
The co-location arrangement also means PAGASA telemetric rain gauges will have uninterrupted power supplies during power outage caused by the weather disturbances.
DOST Undersecretary and concurrently acting PAGASA Administrator Graciano P. Yumul Jr. explained that the agreement saves the weather bureau additional expenses in setting up new locations for its weather forecasting instruments since Smart cell sites are already in place nationwide.
Smart offered to accommodate the installation of additional PAGASA rain gauges in its cell sites nationwide similar to its initiative that covered Metro Manila.
Engineers of PAGASA and Smart earlier identified the ideal sites for co-location of the rain gauges in Ilocos Norte, Ilocos Sur, La Union, Pangasinan, Abra, Benguet, Bulacan, Zambales, Metro Manila, Batangas, Cavite, Laguna, Quezon, Mindoro Oriental, and Marinduque Camarines Norte, and Sorsogon in Luzon and Negros Occidental, Aklan, Antique, Capiz, Iloilo, Bohol, Northern Samar, and Leyte in the Visayas.
Other provinces in Mindanao considered for the project include Lanao Del Norte, Bukidnon, Misamis Oriental, Sarangani, Davao Del Norte, Sultan Kudarat, Agusan del Sur, Surigao del Norte, and Surigao del Sur.
“Smart is very happy to be part of this noble partnership which aims at saving the lives of our people during disasters,” Smart Communications President and CEO Napoleon L. Nazareno said.