**[RESPONSES GROUPED BY AUTHOR]{.underline}**

**Response 1:**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): Civilian.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The academic and research communities play the role of conducting
fundamental research and developing innovative products. These roles are
appropriate for the future.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The basic success of the NSWP has been to promote communication
between federal agencies involved in space weather.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The basic difficulty faced by the NSWP, in my opinion, is the lack
of numerical

statistical measures concerning the impact of space weather. Most of the
evidence supporting the continuation of programs is anecdotal. This is
true even of the published reports for the Halloween storm of 2003. What
is the long-term economic impact of space weather? Often times a report,
issued by the Brookhaven lab, is cited, yet that report is so
bare-boned. I suspect that what is needed to accomplish a more
comprehensive study is detailed recording and publishing of measures
taken to accommodate satellite, airline, powerline, communication etc.
operations. Yet, such information would be difficult to acquire, in part
because it is often considered sensitive.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): There is far too little attention focused on basic infrastructure,
such as

magnetometer arrays and other data-collection efforts.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Once again, most of the programs within NSWP are concerned with
value-added efforts. There is far too little attention given to basic
data collection.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10): I would appreciate speaking personally to the review board.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Jeffrey J. Love, USGS Geomagnetism Group Leader

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): <jlove@usgs.gov>

**Response 2:**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): military research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1):

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2):

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): I DON\'T HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THE NSWP IS DOING! WHY DON\'T YOU PUT
OUT A NEWSLETTER?

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 3:**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): civil basic space weather research, solar physics

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): From solar perspective, two consortia were set up with focused
objectives, one

concentrating on modeling activity near the sun and the other on the
transit of eruptions from the sun to earth. For those of us not members
of these consortia but trying to do work in the general area, it is not
very clear what these consortia have accomplished. To this outsider, the
latter group has achieved some success but the former seems less
successful. Institutions such as mine are not included in these
consortia and have seen support for space weather research decline. My
cynical experience with consortia is that the resources are unevenly
spread among the members with the bulk going to one or two members. The
idea of concentrating available resources in a small group should be
reexamined if results fall short of promises. Perhaps a more inclusive
research structure might be examined. On the other hand, if funding is
very limited, then it should be concentrated in one or two groups so
that a critical mass can be built in at least one institution. In this
case, some small amount of funding should also be spent on really good
ideas from other groups. Replacing the upcoming retirement wave should
get some attention; few young people are going into this research area.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): see above

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): see above

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Availability of regular mapping of solar sub-surface local motion
fields is promising

as a near-term forecast tool. High-cadence and vector magnetic field
measurements reveal significant and characteristic changes that may be
useful diagnostics of the direction and magnitude of B_z in an ICME.
Development of flux transport

dynamo models is very promising for longer range activity predictions.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): n/a

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Adequate funding for people to actually study the vast amount of
good data now being collected.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Solid, sustained collaboration between research and operations
folks.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): Very little about the accomplishments of NSWP is reaching the broad
solar research

community.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Suggest that people with major funding under NSWP give updates at
AGU and SPD meetings.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): I don\'t know enough details to offer any suggestions other than
those above.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10): No restriction. I hope that the assessment committee will call on
some practicing

solar physicists to get the solar perspective (apologies to Lou and
Pete).

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Jack Harvey

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): jharvey@nso.edu

**Response 4:**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): university research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): as I see it, this is a closed \"club\" of insiders who control
funding, evaluations and

publications. There appears to be little or no entry point for one who
is not already part

of the \"in-group\" of controllers-to-their-own-benefit.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Mostly the same as in previous years, except in hype-labels and
\"program\"-statements. Different ideas are not allowed, for that would
dilute the earnings of the insiders.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Lack of alternate paradigm research. \"Anything beyond the current
bandwagon cannot possibly be of any value\" is the attitude of the
controllers of the club.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): YES ABSOLUTELY. But how can an embryonic idea get a chance in this
stale environment?

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): N/A

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): There is a need for small \"high risk\" awards, small enough that
the club-rulers

would not need to be so greedy, say \$25K per year as 3-4 month support
at a time, and so

that those who have many grants already are EXCLUDED !!!

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): CANNOT ANSWER THIS, because I have been excluded from participation
at the interface level, by lack of funding\...

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): Make SMALL grants/contracts available to NON-major league places

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): DON\'T THROW FUNDING RESOURCES INTO THE PROPAGANDA DOMAIN !!!

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): NOT YET

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10): NO

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Prefer not to state

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): no

**Response 5:**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): Although long (23 years) retired from Federal service (NOAA) I
remain active full time in my principal field, development and
applications of ionospheric sounding. I have

stimulated a USAF/AFRL SBIR toward a new generation of \"Dynasonde\"
instruments pioneered at NOAA, and am now a co-PI in a recently-approved
NSF \"Major Research Instrumentation\" proposal to install 5 new
Dynasondes and magnetometers plus 50 GPS receivers in a \"Distributed
Observatory\" in 11 South American countries. The program \'LISN\' seeks
understanding and forecasting capability of the magnetic-equatorial
ionosphere.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): My current contract employment is with the University of Colorado,
CIRES; my office is in NOAA/NGDC, and I \"see\" CIRES mainly by email.
In NGDC and other parts of NOAA, especially the Space Environment
Center, there is intense and continuous (and entirely appropriate)
consciousness of the NSWP. In CIRES there seems to be virtually no such
consciousness among its management, although a few individual scientists
are notable exceptions. The transfer of NOAA\'s SEC into the NWS is (and
is seen as) a major step toward a unifying concept of terrestrial
\"weather\", with potential benefit arising for both sides, from similar
assimilative modeling activities, consolidation of observatories, and
increasing overlap of research areas. Examples of these are the effects
of severe (tropospheric) storms in the ionosphere, interactions of
ionospheric Sporadic E, lightning, sprites (et al.), meteoric input,
industrial and desert dust pollution, etc.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): During my 53-year career, the NSWP ranks with the IGY as the two
most influential

programs affecting my field. Both focused attention and funding on
improved technologies. Today, these include: digital radio;
antenna-modeling-based design; science-based autonomous data analysis
with rigorous error estimates; the development of higher
data-acquisition standards; database management systems, etc. Much more
science, and more soundly-based societal impact is achieved per dollar
invested in the name of the NSWP than for the IGY although both are
notable successes.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): I think the NSWP is on a good course. I hope for more NOAA funding
in the name of the NSWP, and not just to support the SEC; but there may
be the appropriate signs of that already.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): The \"Distributed Arrays of Small Instruments\" (DASI) concept
introduced by the

relevant NAS Decadal Survey needs to be recognized as deserving of broad
US Government support \... e.g., by NOAA, the DoD, DoE, etc. As noted
recently by John Foster, \"DASI may have already started\", insofar as
independent initiatives (LISN, as described above, for example) reflect
the advantages of the DASI concept. But the named federal departments
could and should take direct steps to improve global SWx monitoring and
modeling under the DASI rubric

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): How often does one see the term \"Space Weather\" in the local
newspaper, USA Today, Time, Newsweek, the Atlantic, or in films? Hardly
ever, is my answer. Not enough is done to relate national expenditures
to the NSWP, for popular consumption.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): This (good) question is the first instance I have seen, seeking to
link research

related to the NSWP to this \"new emphasis\". Personally, I totally
discount the value of an aim to visit Mars for the foreseeable future.
But I applaud a renewed lunar-station

initiative on many grounds including its NSWP relevance.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): For question #2 I listed the new technologies which stand poised to
benefit my

research. I would like to answer the present question in, say, 5 years,
when these have had their effect.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): No, I think it is not keeping pace. Why does CIRES\' close
association (via NOAA) with the NSWP not seem to make it more visible in
the UCB academic program? Perhaps NOAA needs some \"NSWP Fellowships\"
for graduate students, via CIRES. Similar remarks are likely applicable
to other universities.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): See my response to 5a. NOAA\'s SEC does get into the news on the
occasions of major solar and geomagnetic events. Hopefully, some means
can be found through its NWS affiliation so that more ordinary SWx gets
an occasional mention in the news media. Does the average citizen know
what part of the solar cycle we are in currently? Why not?

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): I hope the program continues \"forever\". Perhaps it needs a
mechanism by which major research/monitoring/modeling/forecasting
efforts get a NSWP \"Logo\" to add to their collection.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10): No special instructions.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): John William Wright

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): bill.wright@noaa.gov

**Response 6:**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): Academic research major activity is numerical modeling

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1):

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2):

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The major weakness is a fragmented modeling effort. The NSF GEM is
an example of a fragmented program with a veneer of coherence. The
prominent global-scale models all pretend magnetospheric plasma can be
treated as a conducting fluid. The models are based on numerical methods
over twenty years old and have shown very little progress in improving
our understanding of space weather. The space weather community is still
arguing over what a substorm is.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Progress requires the development of global-scale kinetic models. A
global-scale 2-D hybrid code (Swift&Lin, JASTP, 63, 683-704, 2001) has
show the generation of auroral Alfven waves and provided the link
between events in the plasma sheet and the aurora. A full 3-D ,
global-scale hybrid code is needed to understand space weather and to
provide a basis for space weather prediction. Such a project is likely
too large for a single investigator or university department. A major
national laboratory should be given the task. The continued piecemeal
structure of the modeling effort will continue to produce null results.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Progress requires the development of global-scale kinetic models. A
global-scale 2-D hybrid code (Swift&Lin, JASTP, 63, 683-704, 2001) has
show the generation of auroral Alfven waves and provided the link
between events in the plasma sheet and the aurora. A full 3-D,
global-scale hybrid code is needed to understand space weather and to
provide a basis for space weather prediction. Such a project is likely
too large for a single investigator or university department. A major
national laboratory should be given the task. The continued piecemeal
structure of the modeling effort will continue to produce null results.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Daniel W. Swift

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): <swift@gi.alaska.edu>

**Response 7**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): Not military but academic and governmental.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Many many times. Of course! In the very near feature.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): forecasting and predictions as well.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): from the collaborational point of view.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): Sure.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Both.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Fiber optics and information technologies.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): brain exchance and technology exchance.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): observational methods and experimental applications as well.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): This is one step for the future cooperation in my opinion.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10): Of course.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Harutyun Agopyan

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): <harutyun@istanbul.edu.tr>

**Response 8**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research (civil) with military and civilian commercial
applications.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): In my view, the academic and research communities have been
\"rounded up\", as it were, with the large programs (CCMP at
Goddard\...a wasteful effort to get the community to work with others\'
owned/understood codes; CISM\...a good effort to

enroll university researchers in basic research with, presumably,
eventual real-life applications); MURI (a military copy of CISM); and
some NSF programs (CEDAR, SHINE\....all including much the same groups
in those already mentioned). Their

roles, to do space weather research, is short-sighted in that these fine
people continue to do their basic research and to publish papers as
usual\...but that have only tangential impact on operational problems.
Changes that might be required? In my view, shift some of the funding
for the above efforts (50%?) to commercial vendors (many of whom are
equally qualified but motivated toward operational improvements (equally
publishable).

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Notable successes: continuous monitoring of the solar wind at L1 by
ACE. These data are essential for validation of Sun-Earth models that
have the potential for more than one-hour advance warning. Shortfall:
wasteful spending on solar sail spacecraft that would gain an additional
hour\'s warning. Even now, Wind, ACE, and SOHO don\'t always get
precisely the same data except for the exceptional cases of shocks and
CIRs; the nitty-gritty details are not important except for the
fundamental research that can still go on separately. That said,
Sentinels\...spotted around the Sun would be an excellent supplement to
the L1 effort that MUST be continued. The modelers\...those oriented
toward the operational side\...should be included as equal partners with
the experimenters in order to advance future research and technical
development.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): I\'ve mentioned weaknesses above. Suggestion for addressing them:
(a) Include all modelers\...not only the present academically-oriented
groups\...in mission planning; (b) steer these combined groups toward
real-time operational efforts; (c) avoid, like the plague, NASA-type
oriented science-by-committee efforts as proposed by Living With a Star
proposals; (d) support small spacecraft mission with basic
instrumentation (plasma, fields, energetic particles) for the solar wind
monitoring around the Sun\...missions with equal support for model
ingestion and validation; (d) avoid huge computational codes with glossy
graphics that promote NSF computer objectives\....keep the eye on the
ball.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): I see no recent research breakthroughs. Enough has been done in
magnetospheric and ionospheric physics, via multi-spacecraft missions
and publications galore. Let\'s get down to the nitty-gritty forecasting
effort. The basic research will go on, but let\'s not support all of it
because the phrase \"space weather\" is used in proposals. This is

where the field has a bad name. National priorities? L1 monitoring, as
mentioned before; small spacecraft in the interplanetary medium around
the Sun plus equal emphasis (read: money) for the model verifications.
STEREO is a start but doesn\'t go far enough in this direction.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): Absolutely.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): On the basis of comments above, yes.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): I\'ve discussed them above.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities?

What new educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space
weather research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): The CISM effort in outreach and educational activities is fine for
those interested in academic research. For the governmental and
commercial community, I suggest twisting the arms of the people who are
in the real time modeling community to provide their experiences\...good
and bad\...to those interested in operational, vis-a-vis academic,
activities.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): See (7) above.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Success: NOAA/NASA/USAF cooperation on ACE. Possible future
direction that augers well: their cooperation on coronagraph and EUV
disk monitoring of the Sun on GOES-R\....also operational Sentinels if
cost can be contained. Shortfalls: too much money on geospace vehicles
that produce more data that is less useful for magnetosheric model
validations for forecasting\...enough is available for nowcasting. Get
off the solar sail kick (fine, perhaps, 50 years from now) to get
another hour\'s warning. A possible future direction might be to ask the
solar people: which observations would you want to be used operationally
as input to physically-based models? And the same question to modelers!
And, another question for both groups: would you be willing to put your
suggestions (data and models) to REAL-TIME tests to establish
contingency tables and metrics?\...and to publish them? \[I\'ve had one
prominent researcher say to me, regarding metrics, \"No way. That is
doomed for failure!\"\]

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): No special instructions.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Murray Dryer

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): murraydryer@msn.com

**Response 9**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): We are involved in a broad spectrum of space weather activities.

Research:

The development of numerical space weather prediction models, or data
assimilation models for the ionosphere. Our group was part of the Air
Force Office of Scientific

Research/Multi-Disciplinary University Research Initiative (AFOSR/MURI)
program to develop the Global Assimilative Ionosphere Model (GAIM).

Our group pioneered the use of the Global Positioning System, in
particular the global GPS ground receiver network, for characterizing
the dynamic structure of the Earth\'s

ionosphere. This and related technologies are now widely used in
scientific and practical

applications.

Our group also pioneered the use of space-borne GPS receivers for
ionospheric measurement and characterization. This has culminated in the
up-coming FORMOSAT-3/COSMIC constellation of atmospheric/ionospheric
weather and research satellites.

We are working with DoD in their goal to improve prediction of
communications and navigation outages via the C/NOFS satellite. DoD
recognizes that GAIM with input data from C/NOFS will improve their
forecasting goal.

Civil operations:

We support the Federal Aviation Administration\'s implementation of a
civil aircraft

navigation system based on GPS. We provide scientific, data analysis and
algorithm support.

We support NASA\'s Deep Space Network by developing and running a system
that provides estimates of ionospheric delay along lines of sight to
spacecraft being tracked by NASA, acquiring GPS data from the global
network, in particular receivers located near to the three Deep Space
Network tracking stations. This system is used primarily for navigating
interplanetary probes.

Military operations:

We support an operational space weather center at the Air Force Weather
Agency with

ionospheric measurements (total electron content data from ground-based
GPS receivers).

These data are critical to model runs performed by AFWA to support users
affected by space weather. Existing plans are to input the data into
GAIM (the version of the model developed at Utah State, not the JPL
version).

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Roles: Academia has responded well with coupled models, which is a
large thrust of NSWP. Academia and the research communities have
responded well to putting model data and models on the web for easier,
more timely access.

The academic and research communities have not successfully developed
space weather centers, patterned after the weather centers such as NCEP
used for tropospheric weather forecasting (NCEP is National Center For
Environmental Prediction). This is more a programmatic shortcoming than
an academic or community shortcoming. An operational program of weather
prediction could be well supported in the academic and research
communities, if the program were started, which it should be. This is
certainly the case for tropospheric weather. Improving tropospheric
weather forecasts is an important and exciting area that involves
academia and research laboratories.

Note that CCMC is not an operational space weather center. It is a
prototyping center, and since it has no real-time data feeds, it is of
limited usefulness to effective space weather efforts. As far as I know,
CCMC has no plans to become an operational space weather center.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Successes are the development of the Global Assimilative Ionosphere
Model by AFOSR and ONR, but it is much too small an effort and the
impact will be limited until the effort is expanded. It has had limited
impact so far. Given the limited funding, the potential of this approach
is being undercut. There are also models developed by NOAA recently to
do TEC predicition in North America. I hear that is working well, but it
is also a very limited and rather isolated effort.

Fielding an operational space weather satellite such as C/NOFS is a
positive step. This came from the research community lobbying DoD. I
applaud the attempt to field a prototype operational satellite, rather
than another research satellite. Operations requires its own set of
skills and techniques, so scientific research is not sufficient to solve
the space weather problem. Fielding a prototype operational satellite
will help develop the skills necessary to achieve operational
objectives. Fielding only a research satellite will delay the
achievement of operational weather objectives.

Another notable success is greater availability of space weather data in
a timely manner

through the web. This has a positive benefit to research and operations.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The weakness is easy to identify: there is no credible national
program to address

seriously the \"weather\" aspect of space weather.

That is, there is no space weather center patterned after the very
successful NCEP and ECMWF centers for tropospheric weather forecasting
(National Center for Environmental Prediction; European Center for
Medium-Range Weather Forecasts). These centers acquire data and produce
forecasts that are widely distributed and used by the application and
research communities. There is a broad research community dedicated to
adding new data types to these forecasts, and a vigorous research effort
to develop algorithms and computer codes that improve predictive skill.
Effective weather forecasting is a discipline unto itself, involving
scientific research, algorithmic and operational aspects. Such an
approach, known to be successful for tropospheric weather, is almost
completely absent in the NSWP.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): New directions are needed to move space weather out of research and
into operations. The best way to do this is to create weather centers
for space as have been developed for the troposphere, and to integrate
these centers into NOAA.

To build a complex technical infrastructure, the accepted method is to
build prototypes. The prototypes are exercised, performance is assessed
and limitations addressed, and a new prototype is built that
demonstrably improves upon the previous one. Development continues in
this way.

Prototypes must be transitioned to operations along the way, and
performance of the

operational system is compared to the prototype. As new prototypes are
developed, they are integrated into operations, and in this way
operational performance steadily improves.

Performance is constantly monitored by the operational center.

The new direction needed is a path forward for an operational system,
which at this time

does not exist (perhaps bits and pieces exist, but not a full center
modeled after NCEP).

The operations program must be closely tied to a research program that
is capable of

assessing the operational performance and developing the way forward. At
the current time, there is no such integrated operational/developmental
space weather center with continuous live data feeds. Only small,
disconnected pieces of such a system exist, with minimal or non-existent
pathways for continuous development.

A signal deficiency of the program is the funding imbalance between
space sensors and

modeling. Tens to hundreds of millions of dollars over several years are
devoted to

developing space weather sensors that fly in space. Far less than one
tenth of that amount

has been devoted to the models that will use these data, yet these
models are essential to

achieving the desired results. This is a significant deficiency in the
program. If DoD/NASA and NOAA want to spend \$100M for space weather
sensors (e.g. in the NPOESS program), they need a commensurate
investment (\$4-5M/year at least) in operational centers that will use
these data to generate predictions. Producing operational predictions
based on data is very labor intensive. Please consult the budget for
NCEP to see what is needed. The space weather forecasting business is
obviously vastly underfunded.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): See 5b.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): The most important new research directions are related to applied
research: the

research needed to develop and improve space weather operational
systems. This involves a combination of scientific and applied,
operations-oriented research, including research into measurement
systems that must feed the operational centers. The research starts in
earnest after a prototype center is designed and implemented, including
live data feeds and operations-ready models. This is a rich area of
research that the nation has not yet committed to, but has numerous
benefits for the nation (the promise of NSWP).

Regarding the President\'s new emphasis on interplanetary travel, this
is mainly a charge to NASA. Not all national space weather goals should
be oriented along these lines. In fact, NASA has had to de-emphasize
near Earth space weather in favor of predicting Solar Energetic Particle
events to protect astronauts. This has led to a near abandonment by NASA
of near-Earth space weather missions. This creates a gap in the NSWP
that needs to be addressed by a coordinated nationwide effort.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): The \"technique\" is development of a unified prototype operational
center, that has

specific goals in terms of near-Earth space weather, and specific
methods to address

shortcomings in meeting those goals. The model for developing these
centers are the

tropospheric weather centers such as NCEP.

The needed centers are not modeling centers only, but include modeling
and real-time data feeds. Methods to improve the performance of the
prototypes includes detailed analysis of why the predictions fell short
(this often requires deep scientific understanding) and a notion of what
data are needed to improve predictive capability.

A unified operational center can accept new research results and
transition them to

operations. A true operational center is a vehicle by which new research
results can be

assessed in terms of their impact on operations. This assessment process
is the best

quantitative way to transition research results to operations and
achieve the desired

results.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): We need a NSWP operational center (modeled after NCEP) that
advocates for new research results that can improve its operational
predictions. The goal of such a center is to improve prediction, not
just in a narrow area, but in a variety of space weather-related

areas. The unified center (or a few centers) can properly take advantage
of the physical

interconnection of the various data feeds and models. At the same time,
the unified center

can serve as a focal point for the research community to rally around:
new data types, new models and new research results must find their
application through the operational center.

The operational center as a focal point of research is a feature of the
tropospheric weather

program. New modeling approaches and data types are continually being
integrated into the ECMWF or NCEP systems. If a meteorological
researcher has a new cloud parametrization scheme, it must be integrated
into NCEP or ECMWF codes to achieve results. This integration
constitutes the transition from research to operations.

Once the unified center is established, it has an important role in
educating the community about what the current level of performance is,
what sorts of improvements are necessary, and what sorts of models and
data are necessary to achieve improvements, obviously in coordination
with the research community. Operational, developmental and research
communities must be closely integrated. This is best achieved by the
operational center bringing these groups together and serving as a
communications vehicle.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): The operational center serves as a focal point for outreach. Many
outreach activities

should emanate from there, based on excellent visualization methods,
ties to educators and educational institutions, etc.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): The greatest successes of the NSWP are an increased amount of
readily available data on the internet, often in real time; the
development of coupled \"sun-to-mud\" space weather models; and the
beginning of assimilative data models patterned after the assimilative
models used in terrestrial weather forecasting (GAIM).

The greatest shortfall of the NSWP is the lack of a national-scale space
weather centers,

that combine both models and data feeds, patterned after the
tropospheric weather centers

such as NCEP.

Another significant shortfall of the NSWP is the imbalance between
investments in

space-borne sensors, and the investments in the models that use these
data to produce

effective space weather predictions.

The most promising future direction of the program is development of the
national space

weather center, that combines elements of operations, research, and data
centers, patterned after NCEP, ECMWF, etc.

One of the most promising sources of data, GPS receivers in orbiting
constellations, has no programmatic backing from NSWP. The
FORMOSAT-3/COSMIC constellation due to launch in 2006 has no
programmatic backing that will enable these data to be used for
effective space weather prediction. It\'s as if NCEP ignored weather
data acquired from space: it is inconceivable. Yet, in the space weather
arena, ignoring such data is a fact.

I can state it succinctly thus: if human life, or billions of dollars
depended on space

weather prediction, we would have adopted a different approach than has
been adopted thus far. The program today is a very modest change to the
research program that existed before NSWP. In other words, the NSWP is
not an effective program for improving space weather prediction.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10): N/A

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Anthony J. Mannucci

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): Tony.Mannucci@jpl.nasa.gov

**Response 10**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): Research (civil)

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): No comment.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Yes, there have been notable successes, particularly in the
expansion of observational capabilities to monitor space weather
conditions continuously and in near real-time. These products have
commercial and military users.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Excessive effort is being expended on solar research. Although the
sun is the ultimate source of space weather disturbances, the user
community is focused on ionospheric and magnetospheric effects. The
allocation of resources earmarked for space weather should be adjusted
to emphasize the highest-value deliverables.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Since most human vulnerability to space weather is located at
middle latitudes, the

program should be somewhat redirected or expanded to include the
construction and operation of permanent observatories in this zone.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): No comment.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): It appears that the prospects for monitoring space weather by
satellite are

diminishing are a result of the Moon/Mars initiative. The development of
ground-based

networks of relatively inexpensive instrumentation and the exploitation
of commercial

satellite assets (i.e., GPS, Iridium) can help to fill the void.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): My research already relates to operations. Support for exploitation
of the dataset for

space weather deliverables is the greatest need. The rapidly declining
costs of computer and communications are making the cost/benefit aspect
of expansion of ground-based observatory networks very favorable.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): No comment.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Not sure but I might suggest development of a space weather service
that would generate visuals like those associated with tropospheric
weather as a way of making the problem accessible to the general public.
This could be supplemented with exciting space weather images, such as
time lapse photography of the auroral ovals.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): The predictive aspect of NSWP seems to be lagging. Are we able to
do substorm

prediction better than before? Do the models self-validate against
measurements the way that tropospheric weather models do?

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Mike Ruohoniemi

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): mike.ruohoniemi@jhuapl.edu

**Response 11**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Civil research at a university that focuses on GPS scintillation
measurements and design of GPS receivers for science applications.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): This is an extraordinarily broad question. Please allow me to focus
on the shortcomings first. Shortcoming 1. Exaggeration and hyping of
some space weather effects such as the threat to power systems and
\"killer electrons\" damaging satellites. During the last solar maximum
very little of this happened prompting criticism from the

engineering community. Short coming 2. Technology and science have
changed rapidly during the past decade but organizations and bureaucracy
did not. The significance of ionospheric effects on navigation systems
is not appreciated at NOAA SEC or NASA nor is there a concerted effort
to help the FAA as part of the NSWP. **My guess is that the FAA will not
even be invited to comment by this assessment committee**.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The most notable success is establishing that space weather is a
real, significant aspect of our environment that affects our technical
infrastructure. At the outset this was not so clear and now is accepted
\"truth\".

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The primary weakness is focusing on astronaut safety and ignoring
the safety of the US taxpayer. The program could achieve a better focus
by including representatives of the FAA especially those associated with
WAAS or LAAS.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): The national \"priorities\" are temporary as evidenced by the
wholesale re-organization by Griffin.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): There is a real need for individuals with a foot in both camps, so
to speak, who understand the user needs as well as the science involved.
The impedence mis-match, both ways, can be so large that all information
is reflected. An outreach or extension organization to industry could
have substantial impact. For example we recently purchased a GPS signal
simulator (\$300k) for the purpose of simulating amplitude and phase
scintillations. It was delivered and set-up by two members of Spirent.
As part of the set-up process we created a signal that replicated
measured amplitude scintillations.

Seeing this for the first time the Spirent engineers expressed surprise
and then invited us to their next user\'s workshop to demonstrate what
scintillations are for the industrial community. These sort of
interactions could be much more useful if appropriately organized by
trained individuals.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): I am concerned about not involving other agencies, such as the FAA,
in the assessment.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): Please keep them confidential.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Paul Kintner

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 12**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): We have learned to interpret historical archived data in terms of
physical universal

processes. This has made possible an extension of our \"baseline\", or
if you will made it possible to talk about \"space climate\". Climate
here being defined as the combination of long-term trends and frequency
distribution of extreme events. Both of these are essential to
understanding and predicting space weather. This process is still
ongoing and should be supported by preservation and digitization of
historical data and by sustained efforts of long-term future monitoring
of space weather parameters and drivers.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2):

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3):

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Leif Svalgaard

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): leif@leif.org

**Response 13**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research - civil, commercial.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): 1) The resources of MURIs, CISMs, and other funding opportunities
should be opened up to include commercial vendors as part of the
research community. These vendors can make substantial contributions to
space weather research.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The University of Alaska/EXPI "Fearless Forecasts" are a notable
success. These government-funded forecasts are distributed free to
whoever signs up for them.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): 1. Restrictions of MURIs and other major funding opportunities to
only universities is a major weakness. Commercial vendors can offer a
lot in terms of research and should be treated as potential contributors
to research on space weather on a non-discriminatory basis. 2.Protection
of the vendors' intellectual property rights should be included.

3\. Vendors should be included in the planning and implementation of the
NWSP as active participants in planning, research, forecasting, product
development, sales, outreach, etc.

4.NOAA, NASA, DoD, NSF, and the other agencies should expand the role of
vendors in all phases of their space weather programs. 5. A follow-on to
ACE is needed. The dedicated reliable space weather spacecraft should be
located at L1 in the ecliptic

plane. It should employ reliable well-tested instruments and technology.
It should optimize the return of relevant space weather data. It should
not employ solar sails, and it should not be located out of the ecliptic
(as has been suggested so that it can be a communications link for the
south pole, etc.).

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): -

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): -

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): -

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): -

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): -

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Commercial vendors could play a valuable, but so far unused, role
in outreach.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): -

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): -

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Dr. Devrie Intriligator, Carmel Research Center, P.O. Box 1732,
Santa Monica, CA 90406-1732

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): devriei@aol.com

**Response 14**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil

operations, military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): Research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The research community should continue to do what it has always
done: concentrate on performing excellent scientific research. The only
change in its role is that scientists need to be more aware of the
potential application of research to space weather operations. Better
communication with the operational space weather stakeholders is needed,
particularly through workshops and specialized publications.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): See response to question 9.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): See response to question 9.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): See response to question 9.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): See response to question 9.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): The CCMC and modeling efforts at places like Michigan and B. U.
have made space weather models more accessible to researchers and the
operational community. This is only the first step to making models
operational. There is still a need to take validated models from these
modeling centers and turn them into full operational models. The DoD and
civilian rapid prototyping centers need to be strengthened, with people
and improved cyberinfrastructure.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with

research and transition activities? What new educational priorities
would most serve the

needs of the space weather research, governmental, or commercial
community?

A7): There are several new educational activities in space weather based
at CISM, NCAR, and other locations. Web-based space weather educational
activities are proliferating. I believe these efforts need to be
continued, but I don\'t see a need for any new efforts.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): The NSWP should be more proactive in issuing press releases focused
on space weather events. The general public is largely unaware of the
many space weather events that occur, even under quiet magnetic
conditions. We need to be as organized as the astronomical community in
publicizing these events.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): While it's relatively straightforward to list all the
accomplishments achieved since

the start of the program in 1994, it's extremely difficult to establish
the extent to which,

or how, or whether, these accomplishments were the direct result of the
program. One

indisputable fact is that the proliferation of the term "space weather"
began about the same time the program was being established, and that
correlation cannot be coincidental. In the paragraphs below, I speculate
about how different space weather activities were initiated, and to what
extent the NSWP contributed. Then I offer some recommendations based on
these considerations.

The CCMC has always been cited as an NSWP success story. However, the
CCMC is the result of a partnership between Air Force Space Command and
NASA that was begun in 1997 seemingly independent of any action on the
part of the NSWP. The partnership was formalized in an MOA between AFSC
and NASA signed by Dan Goldin and Gen. Howell M. Estis III. The MOA is
dated Feb. 28, 1997. One of the study teams named in the MOA was titled
"Expanded Cooperation on Space Environmnent". A "Terms of Reference" for
this study team attached to the memo has a background section that
begins with a description of the NSWP including a reference to the
strategic plan. So it certainly seems as though the NSWP was considered
in defining this part of the partnership. There was a meeting at Goddard
in June 1997 to discuss this expanded cooperation between Space Command
and NASA, and representatives from NOAA, NSF, and other agencies
attended. One of the working groups formed at that meeting was to
address space weather models. Kevin Scro and Terry Onsager led this
working group, which

later proposed the establishment of a "community coordinated modeling
center". We'll

probably never know whether the NSWP inspired the original partnership
between Space Command and NASA, but certainly the Program played a role
in the Terms of Reference that eventually led to establishing the CCMC,
and in coordinating inter-agency support for the Center after it got
going.

The National Security Space Architect study on space weather is another
example of an

activity that is hard to trace back to the NSWP. The Terms of Reference
that contains the

charge for the Space Weather Architecture Study was approved by the DoD
Space Architect, Maj. Gen. Robert Dickman, in December 1997. The Study
was briefed to the CSW in the same month. Obviously, the Study had been
advocated by forces within the DoD for a long time prior to its
presentation to the NSWP. The TOR explicitly mentions the NSWP Strategic
Plan and uses a definition of space weather that is an exact quote from
that document. The Space Architect Study led to a transition plan, and
by that time the NSWP was sufficiently tied into the process that the
Committee for Space Weather was selected as the body to oversee this
transition. Though the transition plan was never implemented for a
variety of reasons, the Space Architect Study helped to raise the
awareness of space weather within the DoD, and there is no doubt that
the NSWP helped motivate the study in the first place.

Of course, the prime example of the inability to trace origins back to
the NSWP is NASA's Living With a Star program. The concept for LWS was
developed in the summer of 1999 and presented to Dan Goldin in August of
that year. From the Fall of 1999 to Spring 2000, Goddard developed a
preliminary implementation plan for the program, and by summer of 2000 a
program office was established at Goddard. Although the program was
first mentioned to the NSWP CSW in July 1999, a description of the
program was not presented to the committee until one year later. The LWS
program was developed with no coordination with the NSWP, but was
described as "responsive and congruent to the NSWP".

Another program with somewhat cloudy origins is the University
Partnership for Operational Support (UPOS) involving Johns Hopkins
University Applied Physics Lab and the Geophysical Institute of the
University of Alaska Fairbanks. UPOS was first briefed to the Committee
for Space Weather in April 1999, but it had already been underway for a
couple of years. UPOS research has been carried out independently of the
NSWP, but the extent to which the NSWP was used to justify the program
is difficult to determine.

My purpose in recounting this history is to counter claims that the NSWP
"has no teeth".

Just because the program has not directly resulted in millions of new
research dollars

invested in our community, many have underestimated the impact of the
program. I find it frustrating that there are those in our community who
do not take the program seriously

because it has been around for ten years, but still has no budget
attached to it. I am

aware of several large NASA programs that took way more than 10 years
before any money materialized, and with far less to show in terms of
indirect benefits along the way.

Another reason to dwell on these historic events is to help pin down
what the NSWP has done to enable these success stories, so that we can
continue to help in similar ways. In other words, I'm looking for the
common thread in these successes that have helped them happen. I think
the answer is simple. It's the awareness of and appreciation for space
weather as a distinct discipline that has underpinned all of the
NSWP-inspired activities. The development of the strategic and
implementation plans, the many workshops and special meeting sessions,
the focused proposal competitions through NSF program solicitations,
CISM, the MURI modeling centers, the CCMC, the new journal Space
Weather---each of these has contributed to making space weather almost a
household word.

Based on these considerations, I offer several recommendations:

1\) Sponsor more workshops. The series of workshops that were held in
the 90s focusing on space weather impacts were extremely informative and
helped get the research community talking to existing and potential
space weather customers. Space Weather Week has expanded to continue
these efforts, but it's not enough. Focused workshops provide a better
venue for detailed discussions. Also, I think it would be informative to
repeat some of the previous workshop themes to see what has changed in
the past 10 years.

2\) Update program plans. The NSWP Strategic Plan and Implementation
Plans are somewhat out of date. We need an updated or revised plan to
better coordinate among agencies and across space weather activities
that may overlap or complement each other. Plans for LWS and NPOESS have
changed significantly and these changes should be reflected in NSWP
long-range plans. The excellent progress that has been made in modeling
should also be taken into consideration in the new plan, as well as what
we have learned about transitioning models to operations. Furthermore,
budget constraints are causing delays in space missions and inhibiting
the development of new ground-based instrumentation. A thoughtful plan
is needed to ensure that the ground-based and space-based efforts are
coordinated in such a way as to fill the impending gaps in observations
and in keeping the scientific communities engaged in the interim. Roles
for industry and the international community should also be included in
the revised program plan.

3\) Improve communication. Communication among agencies and from the
agencies to space weather stakeholders has proven to be essential in
helping initiate and execute space weather activities. Development of an
NSWP web site has languished for a long time, but recent progress has
been made. A web site will make it more apparent to the community what
the program is doing and also provide a means for feedback to NSWP
planners. Communication among agencies can be improved through more
meetings. As abhorrent as this sounds, meetings can be very effective in
aiding the flow of information. However, these meetings must include
agency representatives at a lower level than the existing CSW members.
The frequency of CSW meetings has been limited because of the busy
schedule of the chairs. More space weather activities should be
coordinated through smaller, focused subcommittees, referred to as Joint
Action Groups by OFCM. The CSW should make use of JAGs to ensure that
program activities continue in between full CSW meetings.

4\) Emphasize the systems approach. Interdisciplinary research has
tremendous staying power in today's world. The NSWP's interdisciplinary
aspects not only relate to studying the space environment as a coupled
system from Sun to mud, but also to its goal of transitioning results
from research to operations, and to education and public outreach.

Although there are many large programs with space weather relevance, the
NSWP is the only overarching program with broad responsibilities
encompassing science, engineering, and education.

5\) Avoid exaggerating space weather impacts. Although the program began
with claims of impending disasters that might occur from space weather,
no one really believed this was a good way to argue the merits of the
program. Just considering the examples given above, one sees that the
successful programs were sold on the basis of intellectual merit---the
importance of simply understanding the space environment to the point
where prediction is accurate. NSWP is a mature program now, and it is
time to move away from exaggerated claims. Space weather is
intellectually challenging and has great public appeal. The importance
of the program is obvious as civilization becomes more dependent on
space-based systems and sensitive technology, not to mention the
resurrection of space exploration. No one will argue with the importance
of what the military refers to as space situational awareness. This
should be the primary driver for the NSWP. There may be dramatic space
weather events in the future, but we should not lead the public to
expect catastrophic impacts. In fact, if there are catastrophic results,
we will find it difficult to argue the success of space weather research
over the last ten years.

Other than these, the only other suggestion I have is to make sure the
program is being

evaluated by the right criteria. Impact takes many more forms than just
the amount of

dollars produced, and history has shown that it's much easier to argue
for increased funding once a discipline or program has gained wide
acceptance.

Note to Panel: My memory of events relating to the NSWP during the last
ten years was aided by looking back through the minutes of the CSW
meetings. I hope OFCM has provided you with these minutes, which
probably date back to 1997 or earlier. It would be nice if these minutes
were put on the NSWP web site.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your

submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Bob Robinson

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): rmrobins@nsf.gov

**Response 15**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): In my opinion the roles of the academic and research communities
are to develop new insights (research) leading to new tools
(applications) to predict the status of the space environment on a near
term basis (within the next month or so). Longer term predictions such
as those associated with the solar cycle are also important, but in an
analogy to meteorological weather, the near term predictions are what
was probably meant by the national space weather program.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): I have not noticed any notable improvements in our ability to
predict space weather and the effects on the environment resulting from
the NSWP. There have been many excellent research results, but the time
has come to put these results to the test of real time operations. Once
the various models are put through their paces in a real time
application mode over several months to years, the weaknesses can be
addressed by future research. (The predictions being done at Boulder on
the arrival time of an interplanetary shock does compare the arrival
times using three different models. I am not certain if any of this work
is funded by the NSWP. Neither do I know of a comprehensive comparison
of the various predictions made over the past several years although
there may be one.)

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): There appear to be four notable shortcomings: (1) Inability to
identify appropriate funds to transition a \"research result\" to a
practical and useful tool for implementation in a real-time operational
mode. These types of funds should

include funding for the person(s) who developed the model being
transitioned so that he/she is an integral part of the process. (2)
Inability to \"compare\" the results of one model against those of
another model. Each model is developed on a set of sample cases; some
models use one set of data while other models use a different set of
data. Unless the models can be actively compared with each other on an
operational basis using the same real-time conditions, it is impossible
to determine the success and shortfalls of each model. (3) Reluctance to
fund studies that will result in empirical or statistical models.
Sometimes these type of models produce better results than some of the
\"fancier, first principles\" models. A good empirical or statistical
model can lead to insights that can be used in future \"first
principles\" studies. (4) A comprehensive list of all models (and
studies) funded by the NSWP should be prepared and be available to the
public. This

list should include the following: Title of research effort, funds
awarded, result of research effort, and how this result has been
implemented in the prediction of the space environment. A negative
result is also important if it shows that something does not work (and
thus no further research is necessary). Perhaps the report of this panel
presently being prepared will list these funded efforts and the result
of each effort. (Note that I would not expect you to give the name of
the PI or the organization involved; however, a comparison of what we
have achieved in better predictability vs. the

amount of funds expended would be most interesting.)

I would not support \"more of the same\" research unless a specific
weakness in a model has been identified from an application. I would
definitely support statistical studies leading to empirical models. Some
individuals have the ability to identify certain related effects
although these same individuals may not be able to assemble the complex

mathematical relationships that may be associated with these phenomena.
I remember that Dr. JoAnn Joselin (who was a forecaster at the NOAA
laboratory years ago) once said that \"if a statistical model worked
better than a mathematical or MHD model, than I will use the statistical
model over a mathematical model\".

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): See my response to question 5b

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): While not in this area, commercial and governmental operational
organizations should be willing to fund the transitioning of some of the
more promising results - particularly those that directly affect their
operations. Again, these types of funds should support the original
developer.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Absolutely. We now need much longer time-period studies, and these
should include historic data (centuries) as well as statistical studies
(over the space era). We need to access, assemble (in a standard format)
and study many of the databases that presently exist; these studies are
relatively inexpensive when compared to funding a spacecraft to get
\"more of the same\" plus \"some new data\" simply to appease the
scientific community and/or \"appear\" to be doing \"something\". There
are some measurements that certainly need to be done and funds should be
allocated for those

measurements. For other measurements, we have almost 50 years of good
data (from the IGY onwards) and 40 years of spacecraft data that should
be evaluated to answer some of the questions presently being asked
related to a moon base or a mission to Mars. Operations on or around the
moon would be subjected to the same environment as that immediately
outside the earth\'s magnetosphere; the extensive near-earth space
measurements since 1965 can be used to evaluate various conditions that
moon operations would encounter. We know that the earth-based
forecasting organizations will be used to support those operations, so
success rates should be based on presently available data.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Newer and faster computer technology has enabled me to produce
better models and made it easier to transition my research to operations
faster. However, many of the models being developed require \"super
computers\", and these are probably not readily available for
operational needs. We also need to be realistic about this. If it takes
3 hours to predict something that will occur within 30 minutes, the
effort is not practical.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): I am not quite certain how to answer this question since many of us
talk individually to members of the \"user\" community. There are some
individuals who look and talk only of their \"successes\" and what will
be required to have a \"better success rate\". (Sometimes these
improvements cost more than they are worth.) They point to very
sophisticated models that many \"users\" cannot easily understand. These
users simply want to know if a new model will improve their operations.
(They really want to know if implementing a new model will improve their
operations by 5 percent or 30 percent

or whatever.) There are also many \"nay sayers\" that something \"won\'t
work\" instead of looking for ways to mitigate the various problems that
exist. Scientists need to make certain that the \"users\" fully
understand what can and cannot be done within certain financial
limitations.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Oddly enough I think there is too much emphasis on \"outreach\".
\"Outreach\" is now just another buzz word that has become popular. The
scientific community should be advocating - at all levels - what they
are doing without having to state that this is part of an \"outreach\"
program. While many high schools and universities are encouraging
promising students to pursue a career in space research, we need to make
certain that there will be jobs open to these students when they
graduate. (I realize that I am probably in a very small minority in my
opinion here.)

We also need to talk to writers of various news and magazine media so
that a the general public is given a positive picture of the value of
the space program in general.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): When I read the initial NSWP documentation I felt that it had been
assembled by people who had vested interests in the program. While this
is not necessarily \"bad\" if it truly reflects the entire community, I
felt that the program was heavily biased toward MHD development (in all
areas), while ignoring statistical studies and/or empirical models. I
should state that I have not applied for any grant under the NSF NSWP.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): You are free to use any of these comments in your report although
I want to approve any remarks that might be attributed directly to me. I
would also like to receive a copy of what I have submitted.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Margaret (Peggy) Ann Shea

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): sssrc@msn.com

**Response 16**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): My primary space weather activity is policy research and policy
education.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): It seems that the academic and research communities have been the
focus of the NSWP and responsible for carrying out the majority of the
work. There seems to be less focus on the involving end user
communities. Who is responsible for engaging the end users? It cannot
all be left to the NOAA Space Environment Center, especially since they
face budget constraints and are understaffed for this huge effort.

One of the successes of the research community is that they have made
great strides in moving the field forward. Also, it appears that there
are more collaborations and synergy within the community.

Regarding shortcomings, scientists could always learn more about the
connection between the research, operations, and end-users.

In the future, funding for basic and applied research in space weather
will continue to be key to the program's success. Space weather has
advanced rapidly in the last decade or so, and I expect to see continued
success.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The NSWP is an example of successful interagency and scientific
community coordination. I have seen an increase in public awareness
about space weather over the last 10 years. More and more non-technical
people have heard of space weather

and aware of potential impacts. This is probably due to the public
outreach efforts and media (although limited) exposure.

The Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling (CISM), an NSF Science
and Technology Center led by BU, has proved that space weather is
getting the attention at higher levels in NSF. To have multiple
institutions come together to form CISM

demonstrates a synergy within the community.

The model outputs by CISM and the Center for Space Environment Modeling
(CSEM) at the University of Michigan prove that this field is getting
better at modeling, visualization, and understanding the Sun-Earth
environment.

In my current area of policy research, I find that as the NSWP continues
to make progress, more and more policy issues emerge. Right now, this
policy area is far behind policy research in meteorology or space
exploration, although there are a lot of similarities and lessons to be
learned. I would like to think that policy research will help justify
future research and technology development. This is one avenue of
communicating with policy makers who ultimately control the funding
levels and national priorities.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): From my perspective, I would say weaknesses exist with user
interactions and private sector vendor interactions. Also, I would like
to see more visible participation from the DOI, DOE, and FAA. Many of
the user communities exist within these

agencies, so more involvement would be good. There seems to be varying
levels of involvement with all the agencies.

How is the NSWP engaging the private sector? Are NSWP meetings open to
vendors? Are an adequate number of grants being given to those in the
private sector?

Part of the success of the NSWP is that it can claim the connection
between space weather and societal and economic impacts. However, hardly
any funding is set aside to examine the connection and pursue research
in this area. More opportunities should be made to engage economists,
social scientists, policy researchers, etc.

We also need a process for collecting and archiving a database of
impacts. NGDC has collected satellite anomalies in the past, but what
about other industries? I see this as a major weakness, especially if we
want to stress the impacts of space weather.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Science and services (and the transition) should be considered at
the same time in order to increase the pace of improvements in
products/services and demonstrate societal benefit.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): The NSWP should redirect to address evolving user needs. For
example in the case of aviation, many in the industry are concerned
about risks during high latitude and polar routes, which include
disruptions in HF communications, GPS errors, and radiation hazards to
humans and avionics. With more airlines increasing their use and
consideration of polar routes, we are likely to see this become an even
more growing concern. More agency collaboration is needed in addressing
these user needs. With my involvement in the International Committee for
Space Weather Impacts on Aviation Safety (ICSWIAS) I am aware that
airline unions are particularly concerned about health impacts from
exposure to high-levels of radiation on polar flights during solar
events. So, airline unions want legislation enacted that is similar to
legislation in the European Union. The EU has required airlines to track
crewmembers exposure levels and educate them about possible risks.
However, without more medical evidence, the U.S. airlines, FAA, etc. do
not want to discuss this issue. We need to encourage more collaboration

between the space physics, medical, and aviation communities. I
understand some NASA groups are looking at radiation impacts on
astronauts, but that information is not translating well to the aviation
community. The FAA's Civil Aeromedical Institute (CAMI) offers
information on how much galactic radiation dose is received on a flight
between any two airports in the world, however many in the community
question the usefulness of the calculations. This is just one example in
aviation. Other industries with their own set of user problems (i.e.,
satellite, electric power, navigation, etc.) could be better addressed
through interagency coordination.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): As I mentioned in question 3, more research is needed in the
economic, social, and policy areas.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): n/a

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): How do you release new results of space weather research to the
user communities? They do not attend AGU and only a few may attend Space
Weather Week.

University space weather curriculum should involve a discussion on
impacts. I have been involved in starting a policy course for space
weather students with Art Poland at George Mason University. We found
that the students really enjoyed this course and it helped them see the
connection between their research and society. I plan to offer material
to other space weather university departments so they can integrate
material into their courses. This will be expanded to include the
broader atmospheric sciences. The result will be a new generation of
space weather scientists who will be more effective in the policy
process and communicating with policy makers.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): There should be more of a focus on educating policy makers,
specifically Capitol Hill and the Executive Branch (OMB, OSTP, etc.)
When SEC funding was in limbo, a hearing was held at the House Science
Committee. Some staffers were probably

learning about space weather for the first time. It would be great if
there was an effort to educate policy makers. I understand this can be
problematic for government employees, but a discussion about next steps
would serve the community well.

From my experience with the space weather vendors, they would like to
have input into the NSWP. I know NOAA/SEC meets with the vendors to
discuss customer issues, but that is not enough. What kind of education
is being directed at vendors? There has been talk about a space weather
industry. Although it is not really developed yet, is this something the
scientific community wants to promote or allow market forces to take
their course?

There is always a bias in outreach that it is one-sided. Instead there
should be a process for allowing outsiders to have an influence in the
NSWP.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): In summary, the NSWP is an excellent example of interagency and
scientific community coordination. Overall, the NSWP has advanced the
space weather field in the sciences, services (less so), and public
awareness. However, more attention should be paid to the end users and
impacts (cost-benefit analysis, collection/database, economic and policy
research, etc.).

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): none

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Dr. Genene Fisher, Policy Program, American Meteorological Society

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): fisher@ametsoc.org

**Response 17**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research & Education

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Many breakthroughs come from the academic community, and the
research efforts at universities remain strong. However, most
universities do not take space weather as seriously relative to their
educational enterprise as, for example, weather on earth.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): There are notable successes in many areas. Many breakthroughs have
come from SOHO and ACE, and its connected view with Earth-based systems,
such as POLAR, SAMPEX and others. There are, in my opinion, certain
tools that have not delivered to

promise. I have yet to find a quantitative result from IMAGE, for
example.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): There is confusion about the relevance of Space Weather. Do we
\*need\* space weather predictions as a Nation? If yes, why can\'t NOAA
get 100 M\$ to build a simple L1 observer? Why can\'t they even get a
coronagraph? Does the DOD care? The disconnects between a very motivated
research community and the apparent National imperative to do space
weather research needs to be addressed. There is a tremendous disconnect
related to the transition of knowledge from research to application.
From the outside it looks like a stack of red-tape and nobody knows the
way around it. In many ways a motivated private industry may be more
successful than NOAA.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): The program should focus on transition and feedback from operations
to research. Such connections would tremendously improve fundamental
research in this area, because it would provide specific value systems
that could be used.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): NA

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): An enhanced emphasis of the global understanding of the
heliosphere seems to be necessary. This understanding can occur through
multi-point observations and modeling efforts that are tightly linked.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): As mentioned above, there seems to be soo.. much red tape that many
good researchers get discouraged. An enhanced focus on private industry
may be more successful than changing the government.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities?

What new educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space
weather research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): No - because most universities are not taking it seriously. We are
also not seeing any hires in this area. Where are the needs?

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): No opinion.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shorftfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): The transition from rather compartmentalized research to integrated
system investigations has been astounding.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): Just call me if you want to.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Thomas Zurbuchen

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): thomasz AT umich.edu

**Response 18**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): We perform research for the military and civil groups.

Research:

The development of numerical space weather prediction models, or data
assimilation models for the ionosphere. Our group was part of the Air
Force Office of Scientific Research/Multi-Disciplinary University
Research Initiative (AFOSR/MURI) program

to develop the Global Assimilative Ionosphere Model (GAIM).

Our group pioneered the use of the Global Positioning System, in
particular the global GPS ground receiver network, for characterizing
the dynamic structure of the Earth\'s ionosphere. This and related
technologies are now widely used in scientific and practical
applications.

Our group also pioneered the use of space-borne GPS receivers for
ionospheric measurement and characterization. This has culminated in the
up-coming FORMOSAT-3/COSMIC constellation of atmospheric/ionospheric
weather and research satellites.

We are working with DoD in their goal to improve prediction of
communications and navigation outages via the C/NOFS satellite. DoD
recognizes that GAIM with input data from C/NOFS will improve their
forecasting goals. We are performing research with the GAIM model and
C/NOFS data to demonstrate improved forecasts.

Civil Applied Research:

We support the Federal Aviation Administration\'s implementation of a
civil aircraft navigation system based on GPS. We provide scientific,
data analysis and algorithm support.

We support NASA\'s Deep Space Network by developing and running a system
that provides estimates of ionospheric delay along lines of sight to
spacecraft being tracked by NASA, acquiring GPS data from the global
network, in particular receivers located near to the three Deep Space
Network tracking stations. This system is used primarily for navigating
interplanetary probes.

Military Support:

We support an operational space weather center at the Air Force Weather
Agency with ionospheric measurements (total electron content data from
ground-based GPS receivers) that demonstrate these data are critical
input to model runs performed by AFWA to support users affected by space
weather. Existing plans are to input the data into an operational GAIM
running at AFWA (the version of GAIM developed at Utah State, not the
JPL version).

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Academia excels at basic research, and the non-academic research
community is broadly divided into two areas: civil and military.
Non-academic civil research is NASA-related research that is science
focused and similar in many ways to academic research. Military needs
have led to the development of captive laboratories and federally funded
research and development centers that serve military needs, at least
broadly, and these institutions also support military applied research.

Applied DoD research is an important element of NSWP. However, the
largest shortfall is the gap between the funding devoted to
space-weather sensor development and what is spent on using the data
from the sensors for improving space weather nowcasting and forecasting.
For example, far less funding is devoted to the Global Assimilative
Ionosphere Modeling (GAIM) efforts, than is spent on the space-borne
sensors than are meant as input into GAIM, even considering the fact
that spaceborne hardware is more expensive generally than modeling. This
fact does not adequately explain the differences in funding. Substantive
improvements to space weather forecasting requires improvements in
sensor and modeling areas. This imbalance of resources appears to be a
fundamental issue for NSWP.

Academic research has spanned a wide range, from basic scientific
research, to applied research such as prototype forecasting systems,
e.g. algorithms for predicting the Dst index. This is a productive
sector, however it is largely uncoordinated, and it is not clear within
the program context how the results of this research are to be
coordinated and

maintained, particularly after a grant period or initiative period has
ended. There is no centralized institution that will maintain the
knowledge and bring it forward into the future. The process of long-term
capture of space weather capability is largely ad-hoc.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Successes are the development of the Global Assimilative Ionosphere
Model by AFOSR and ONR. There are also models developed by NOAA recently
to do TEC prediction in North America. I understand that is working
well, but both these efforts

are very limited in scope and funding. There are coupled model efforts
which are breaking new ground and will eventually lead to vastly
improved prediction capability (e.g. CISM).

The CCMC is a very positive development in modeling. It\'s scientific
uses are currently eclipsing its use for operational prototypes, but it
is serving an excellent function for space weather research.

Fielding an operational space weather satellite such as C/NOFS is a
positive step. This came from the research community lobbying DoD.

Another notable success is greater availability of space weather data in
a timely manner through the web. This has a positive benefit to research
and operations.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): One weakness mentioned earlier is the mismatch between resources
devoted to space weather sensors and resources devoted to numerical
space weather prediction models (such as the GAIM model). Addressing
this mismatch is a matter of government priorities and re-directing
funding to maximize end-to-end effectiveness of national space weather
efforts.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes! The NSWP program appears to not acknowledge a major government
program where space weather is very important: the use of GPS for civil
aircraft navigation. This use is part of two Federal Aviation
Administration programs: Wide and Local-Area Augmentation System (WAAS
and LAAS). Both of these FAA navigation programs for airspace
modernization are strongly impacted by space weather, and the lack of
knowledge of key aspects of space weather science has hindered the
effectiveness of these programs. Yet, there is no effort to address this
problem specifically, despite the fact that millions of people will be
affected every year when these programs are fully adopted, and despite
the fact that these programs cost taxpayers billions of dollars.

A significant new direction in NSWP is needed. It is specifically to
address the space weather needs of WAAS and LAAS, given the national
investment in, and wide use of, these systems. NSWP should address the
science that hinders the availability and utility of WAAS and LAAS. This
science relates to the formation of severe gradients in ionospheric
total electron content (TEC) over the conterminous US (CONUS), Alaska,
and Hawaii during moderate to severe geomagnetic storms. Significant
gaps exist in our scientific understanding of these features, which
effectively \"shut down\" WAAS and LAAS when they exist (assuming they
are detected!) and make the systems unusable for precision approach
landings, the main purpose of these systems. Of particular concern is
the possible formation of small spatial-scale, large-magnitude gradient
structures that might elude detection by the system\'s real-time
ionospheric monitoring network. Also of concern are the formation of
ionospheric plasma irregularities that cause scintillation of the GPS
signal and receiver loss-of-lock. The NSWP should have programs
specifically to address these phenomena, and should solicit input from
FAA on the impact of these phenomena, and how science can be used to
address the problems.

For more information about these programs, please contact Deane Bunce of
the FAA: 202-493-4725, deane.bunce@faa.gov.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): We support the FAA, which has governmental operational interests.
In our opinion, new directions are needed in light of the WAAS and LAAS
operations.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): I have addressed our research interests in a separate
questionnaire.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): I have addressed this in a separate response.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities?

What new educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space
weather research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): As far as WAAS and LAAS are concerned, I am not aware of how these
programs are being updated as to progress. It has to be realized that
WAAS and LAAS programs are for navigation, and do not have a \"space
weather\" research or operational capability per se. Therefore, the
space weather community must proactively educate the community of WAAS
and LAAS implementers.

NSWP should set up channels of communication specifically for WAAS and
LAAS, given the size of these programs, and how critically they are
affected by space weather.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): A specific focus on WAAS and LAAS, and possibly other Department of
Transportation programs (e.g. Coast Guard CORS program).

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): NSWP has been very successful in many areas. However, ties should
be strengthened with the large national programs related to civil
GPS-based navigation emanating from the Department of Transportation:
WAAS, LAAS, CORS, etc.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Anthony J. Mannucci

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): Tony.Mannucci@jpl,nasa.gov

**Response 19**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): CIVIL and COMMERCIAL

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): SPACE WEATHER HAS BECOME A SLOGAN AND A CRUTCH TO HELP SUPPORT
WHATEVER ONE\'S SUB-DISCIPLINE IN SPACE SCIENCE MIGHT

BE. PRIMARILY THE TRAPPED RADIATION BELTS OF THE PLANETS EXPERIENCE
LARGE UPHEAVALS, THE ATMOSPHERES TO A MUCH LESSER

EXTENT. SPACE FLIGHT BETWEEN THE PLANETS IS OF INTEREST WHEN GOING TO
THE MOON AND TO MARS.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): NO, THE FUNDING MONEY HAS LARGELY DISAPPEARED INTO THE \"USUAL
SUSPECT\'S\" POCKETS

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): THE MONEY IS NOT SPENT ON TESTING OUT NEW IDEAS, BUT SEAMS TO GO TO
THE \"STANDARD PLAYERS\"

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): YES, GET SOME PEOPLE INTO THE DECISION-ARENA, PERSONS WHO HAVE NOT
HAD \"INFLUENCE\" DURING THE PAST DECADE: UNUSED

TALENTS, \"NEW BLOOD\", NEW THINKING.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): CANNOT TELL, BECAUSE OF LACK OF KNOWLEDGE OF ANY ACCOMPLISHMENTS

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): CANNOT TELL, THE SPACE WEATHER FIELD HAS TOO FEW (WELL-ENTRENCHED)
PLAYERS. SURELY WE MUST GO BEYOND THE OLD

CONCEPTS OF STORMS, SUBSTORMS, TRAVELING-SHOCKS, FORBUSH DECREASES, ETC.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): PLASMA, PHOTON AND ENERGETIC PARTICLE IMAGING INSTRUMENTATION WITH
HIGH RESOLVING POWER. THIS WOULD BE AN EFFORT IN VISUALIZATION AS WELL
AS EXPANDED DETECTION

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): LARGELY THIS IS A PLAYGROUND FOR THE WELL-CONNECTED PLAYERS. AN
EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM WOULD BE HELPFUL, BOTH FOR

RESEARCHERS IN GENERAL AND FOR THE AMERICAN PUBLIC

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): INTERFACE BETTER WITH THE MEDIA, BOTH NATIONALLY, STATEWISE, AND
LOCALLY

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): DIFFICULT TO SAY, BECAUSE SO LITTLE IS KNOWN ABOUT WHAT HAS BEEN
ACCOMPLISHED, IF ANYTHING.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): IF I WRITE MY NAME, THE \"USUAL SUSPECTS\" WILL SEE TO IT THAT I
NEVER WILL GET A GRANT EVER AGAIN. IT WOULD SEEM THAT YOU ARE SOME OF
THE USUAL SUSPECTS\.....

11\) Name (optional):

A11): N. N.

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): NONE@NOWHERE.NET

**Response 20**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research (military)

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Successes: basic research can help establish the science behind
improving predictive capabilities. Shortcomings: To date, too much
emphasis on developing correlative techniques to fit observed time
series. These techniques tend to avoid or miss severe disturbances,
which are the costly events. Need more emphasis on accurately predicting
large disturbances (e.g., severe substorms, storms, atmospheric
heating). I suspect that small to moderate disturbances are so
ubiquitous that most operational systems are designed to withstand them.
To be really valuable to operators, I think that the big potentially
costly events are of major interest to users. The research community
should be more encouraged (by funding agencies) to address the needs in
this area.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): No noteworthy successes so far. From where I am, it seems that
various agencies have not quite figured out what they really want to do.
It seems as though the agencies didn\'t expect real progress that can be
transitioned to operations to come out of their funded programs.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Funding agencies and their managers need to take a more active role
in ensuring that meaningful and quantitative metrics be established and
that research programs address and be judged on the basis of those
metrics. The traditional \"science\" approach is not optimum (see item 1
above). The metrics should not be established by researchers themselves.
That is, the research community needs to rise to an externally imposed
standard.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Yes. But, the new emphasis on interplanetary travel goes behind
space weather. Need shielding hardware for the astronauts.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Mostly, funding.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): The user community should be invited to clarify and document their
needs to the government agencies they deal with.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Let Congress know about the needs. Let operators know of the
availability of existing/future products and invite their comments.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): The \"traditional science approach\" that dominates now, i.e.,
construct models and discuss how well some chosen time series can be
matched well, will not go far. Need to develop more objective ways to
judge models/techniques. Give funding agency managers more
responsibility to demand and choose programs with demonstrated
user-relevant promise. The traditional approach of relying almost
entirely on peer-review panel tends to favor the status quo (i.e., the
traditional approach) and has not been effective. The managers, of
course, are to be held accountable for their choices based on the
demonstrable results. If a technique or program should prove very
promising, the managers should be given the ability to transition the
technique to operations.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): James Chen

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): chen@ppd.nrl.navy.mil

**Response 21 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): civil

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): academic and research organizations like to study new things, not
necessarily solve problems for operational applications. Focusing the
academic & R&D resources on solving specific problems can work.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): providing data and expertise on the severity and impacts of
ionospheric storms is an area that could provide direct benefit. If NSWP
could predict time and location of iono disturbances (airports/terminal
areas), this could improve service to GPS equipped aircraft.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Work on predictions of space weather, such aas iono storms, to the
level of accuracy and reliability as tropospheric weather prediction by
the NWS

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Most people don\'t know the NSWP exists.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): leo.eldredge@faa.gov

**Response 22 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The process has been half-hearted with far too many people merely
relabelling what they were already doing as space weather.

The solar, geospace, and earth science communities meet together all to
rarely and when they do they go off to their own sessions.

We have allowed a poor and misleading program (often politically
motivated) of research lead the debate of decision makers on the role of
space weather and climate change.

Industry and government agencies are failing to report SWx issues and
problems. NASA, for example, is trying, at best, to engineer it way
around SWx effects on the space exploration vision without committing to
fully understand the problem or, at worst, ignoring it and hoping it
will go away. They are betting the lives of the astronauts.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): No.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Lack of coordination between the relevant research communities.
Little commitment by any agency (NSF, NASA and NOAA) to work together to
fund targeted programs or launch joint missions (for example: Why is
Triana still in a clean room at GSFC while ACE is showing signs of
failing?). An inability or unwillingness to actually produce a clear
picture of the economic impacts, if any, of SWx. Lack of public interest
shows the ineffectiveness of current EPO campaigns.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Absolutely!

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): NASA needs to draw the various research communities together by
only funding genuinely cross discipline research. NOAA needs to start
funding research into space weather to help the predictive capability
(not existent) NSF needs to put SWx on the front burner and create a
separate budget line for space weather. All three agencies (and DOD)
must find ways to discourage \"more of the same\" research.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): High-end computing for modeling. A single repository of calibrated
solar, geophysical, and atmospheric science data with easily accessible
catalogs and data retrieval algorithms. Including detailed explanations
of the data and its pitfalls (e.g., instrument papers, file formats,
etc.)

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): No, EPO is amateurish and ineffectual. We need a complete rethink.

Everyone seems to be concentrating on k-12 but the US numbers of science
and engineering graduates continue to plummet. Something needs to be
done urgently.

Meanwhile most of us are ignoring the general public (the ones who pay
the bills)

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): We need a national initiative of science education (not just SWx)
with the goals to increase american scientific literacy and increase by
30% the number of graduates in science and engineering in the next 5
years. Much more ambitious goals need to be set for the out years.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Need to focus on the Sun for long term prediction (helioseismology,
magnetic transport, cycle characteristics, coronal dynamics and flare
research). Geospace needs to get its act together and stop studying
details and start looking at the interfaces between the charged
atmosphere and the neutral atmosphere (energetics, dynamics,
composition).

The atmospheric scientists need to start collaborations with us.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): None

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Dr. Keith T. Strong

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): <keith.strong@lmco.com>

**Response 23 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): As a research scientist, in order to provide the basic
understanding of particle injections into the inner magnetosphere from
solar wind, a global solar wind-magnetosphere interaction has been
investigated with a PIC code. Since the resources of supercomputers are
not enough to perform quantitative simulations using PIC code, the
extensive research is not supported by any agencies as MHD simulations
have.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): MHD models have dominated; however, recently the difficulties
involved in investigating particle injection during substorms and storms
with MHD models have been recognized widely. In my opinion, global PIC
simulations have to be developed for the future. The computational
resources have progressed sufficiently to perform PIC simulations with a
reasonable scale. However, substantial support for this kind of research
has been neglected while MHD models have been supported. Funding should
be shifted toward kinetic models in principle, which provide particle
injections properly. All

scientists should know that MHD simulations cannot provide particle
injection properly.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): CISM has been successful in providing global dynamics regarding
space weather. However, there are limitations because these studies have
relied heavily on MHD models. Recently, CISM has finally seen the need
for a kinetic model which can provide proper particle injections for
substorms and storms.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Due to a single fluid calculation, MHD models cannot provide
correct particle injection which is essential for space weather. Only a
kinetic model such as a PIC global simulation can provide it and there
is no substitute for this model. Extensive research with PIC simulation
needs to be organized at a center such as CISM. Without this effort the
space weather program will not progress in the future.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): In order to assess high energy particle injection into the inner
magnetosphere, which is known to cause damage to satellites, a new model
has to be developed. In principle only PIC model can provide high energy
particle injection.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Massively parallelized PIC simulation with real time visualization
on the largest available supercomputer has to be developed as a
complement to MHD simulations.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities?

What new educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space
weather research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Simulations models such as MHD and PIC need to be more widely
recognized in a systematical way.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): The limitations of MHD models have to be discussed openly and new
models such as PIC model need to be implemented for the future.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Kinetic models have to be implemented as supplementary to MHD
models.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): I would be happy to discuss this matter in greater detail.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Ken-Ichi Nishikawa

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): ken-ichi.nishikawa@nsstc.nasa.gov

**Response 24 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): research- academic lab environment, space plasma physics

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): the NSWP has been largely invisible- even though it may be behind
many important

directions and activities in the discipline and space weather
communities, it is hard to see what is there simply because of ongoing
motion and progress, and what is really attributable to the existence of
the NSWP.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): See above. I see all kinds of progress- at NOAA SEC (e.g. space
weather week\'s

popularity and content, involvement with research model development and
transitioning),

at NASA (especially the LWS program and associated missions), at NSF
(e.g. CISM), and the DoD (the recent MURI space weather centers at UCB
and UMich), but it is not clear whether all this things are enabled by
or supported as part of the NSWP plans and

agency responses. It is hard to point to anything major and specific and
say \"that is

there because of the NSWP\" - but perhaps NSWP is behind it all!

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Weaknesses include lack of visibility. Lack of advertising as to
what resulted from its influence and actions. Also continuing major
holes looming - such as nobody

picking up on lack of future plans for key elements such as L1
interplanetary in-situ

monitors and earth-orbiting or L1 coronagraphs after SOHO. Also NOAA
still does not

seem to sufficiently invest in transitioning research to operations. The
DoD space

weather enterprise seems confusing and unsettled to an outsider-likely
due to the fact

that it is a relatively invisible (and less peer-reviewed) program.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Space Weather is something that should become more main-streamed at
this stage of the game- with space assets in place and an NSWP group to
have interagency dialogues, cooperation, and plans it can become a much
more organized and visibly successful effort if agency barriers are
dropped and everyone takes on their appropriate part. The NSWP needs to
develop a broad vision for what can be in place in \~10 years time-and
go for it. They will be critical for supporting any continuing NASA
version of the vision for space exploration, as well as for supporting
further commercialization of

space.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): n/a

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): We should strive toward realistic numerical modeling of the space
weather system(s)-along the lines of traditional meteorological models -
and put the models in places where new generations of researchers can
work to ever-improve them. We should have more than one major community
model to allow multiple approaches to be tested. These models should
include every relevant aspect of the Sun, interplanetary space and
Geospace. They should be used as exploration tools in Sun-climate
coupling studies. We should also strive to better understand how the
physics of the solar interior leads to space

weather effects. We should extend the meaning of space weather to
include the space

environments of other planets- both for what we can learn from
comparisons with Earth,

and because there is a goal of human exploration

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): continuing L1 information- plasma, fields, energetic particles -
WITHOUT LAPSES (may require an operational platform approach after ACE)
improved solar information- magnetic fields/active regions in the
interior- from farside field measurements and global vector field
measurements- including chromospheric vector magnetograms (e.g. added to
SOLIS) taken in high time cadence and with high spatial resolution
Modeling- further development of models coupling the solar interior
(dynamo models) to the corona. further development of techniques by
which solar data can actively drive coronal transient models, further
development of models that can follow the effects of solar/coronal
activity deep into the atmosphere (e.g. WACCM at NCAR)

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Space weather education options now abound- there are a number of
\"schools\", many groups like GEM,SHINE and CEDAR that foster student
development (though the students engaged in these groups need to have
cross discipline lectures on a more regular basis), HAO and LWS have
postdocs and fellowships. Virtually all missions and major

research groups have EPO senior members as part of their activities.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): It would be nice if the NSWP could make a \"one stop shop\" of
links or a search engine that is geared toward all the resources now
available for space weather EPO (and research!). There is a tremendous
amount accessible on the internet-but one has to

know the right key words and do other complicated linked searches, which
may not be

so easy for an educator or interested layperson coming from outside

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Need to make it clearer in the larger community what NSWP is doing
and planning-

and how it has had and continues to have major influence on the space
weather enterprise. Perhaps more regular surveys of this kind- say every
5 years- would keep useful feedback flowing into the executive decision
making process

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): not confidential

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Janet Luhmann

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): jgluhman@ssl.berkeley.edu

**Response 25 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Providing a solid foundation in the underlying science of space
weather models; Providing the opportunity for students to participate in
an activity which has \'real-world\' implications.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Yes, providing research funding to continue space weather research
at colleges and

universities; the successful transition of science models to operations
models.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Exposure and a unique identity for the community. Difficult given
the broad participation.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Perhaps a stronger tie to industrial/civilian needs.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): I disagree with the President\'s new emphasis and do not feel that
the NSWP needs to also move in that direction.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Communication with people who have expertise in such transitions.
Such communication will help to focus and refine research into the most
appropriate form for the transition.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Yes and no. It seems that from the commericial perspective there
are many more pressures that have much greater impact than space weather
(electric deregulation, ice storms, operator error, etc.)

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Exposure to the broader community.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Overall, I think it is doing a good job.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Simon Shepherd

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): simon@thayer.dartmouth.edu

**Response 26 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Performing research on the fundamental physical processes in space
weather. This is an appropriate function of the academic community.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Quantifying the effects of the ionosphere and plasmasphere on both
civilian and military navigation, i.e., GPS, and communications systems.
The measurable benefits are quantitative estimates of GPS disruptions
from ionospheric space weather at high, mid, and low latitudes. This
wealth of data justifies future investment in ionospheric space weather
and its prediction using first-principles models.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Space weather operational effects on both civilian and military
systems are not understood in the academic research community.
Consequently research objectives can not be focussed in the right
direction.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): No

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): Need more emphasis on the development of first-principles
predictive models. This is major need in operational communities.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): No

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Model validation and prediction studies, in a global sense, of
quantities needed in

operations, e.g., amplitude of GPS fading during stormtime periods at
mid latitudes.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Presentations from NSWP users on current issues, possibly at
national meetings, AGU?

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shorftfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
diposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Michael Keskinen

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): keskinen@ppd.nrl.navy.mil

**Response 27 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Military operations \-- operation Department of Energy
instrumentation onboard US spacecraft in geosynchronous orbit.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The NSWP is coordinating the advance of understanding of how the
space environment works.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The NSWP has led to the understanding of geomagnetic storms \-- how
the solar wind plasma produces the magnetospheric plasma which produces
the ring current and spacecraft charging.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): No shortfalls. Keep up the work so more progress can be made.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): No.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): None.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Yes.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): None.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Joe Borovsky, Los Alamos National Laboratory

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): jborovsky@lanl.gov

**Response 28 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): military

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Quality of the product has been enhanced dramatically since its
initiation of NSWP program.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): I think it is due to better communication among users, developers
and and researchers.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Networking and customer service are the major shortfall among
developer and delivery.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): It should be a longer term.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): I think it is.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President.s new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): No comments.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): If it delivers an real-time or near real-time product, it will be
an important improvement.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): I think current level of efforts meets the appropriate requirements
on my research.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): No comments.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): NSWP program is an example of success in this area.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): Not necessarily.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Junho Choi

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): junho.choi@nrl.navy.mil

**Response 29 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Our company\'s participation in NSWP has been to produce usable
models of the near-earth space environment and develop metrics to
measure specifications and forecasts. We are a small R&D company.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The academic and research communities have collaboratively advanced
the understanding and modeling of the many aspects of space weather. The
coupled solar wind - magnetosphere - ionosphere - thermosphere system is
a complex unit that involves physics on many scales. No one person or
institution can accomplish the whole task of understanding, measuring,
and modeling the whole system. Wide distribution of tasks is a good
thing. The group activities seem to be ever increasing in size. Is the
small group or individual being lost in the funding directions of
government agencies? Perhaps individuals are not effectively used by
NSF/NSWP? Perhaps CCMC integration of small group or individual efforts
could be showcased.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The CCMC has become the show case for state-of-science models of
space weather.

Additionally, the NOAA SEC weather specifications have seen dramatic
improvement in usability and sophistication over the duration of NSWP.
Placing models at CCMC should be encouraged. Community models need to be
improved (MSIS, HWM, etc.) Everything is now proprietary. I suggest that
is not a good thing. The community models should receive funding for
improvements.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The available of real-time data for models to produce space weather
specification and forecasts is only now becoming possible. This is the
next effort required of the NSWP, that is, emphasis on real-time data
streams for modeling with data assimilation to improve specifications
and forecasts. The program should not consider its mission complete
until \'real-time\' becomes widely used in all aspects of the Space
Weather program.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Support and integration of the eGY and hGY into Space Weather
program is required to accomplish future objectives. The space weather
system is a globally coupled system and requires globally distributed
datasets. International collaboration is a must for success.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): Need for ground-based (or rather ocean-based) instrumentation is
required to complete the space weather picture. (but I am primarily a
researcher)

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Turning away from the solar-earth system is not useful. We are
just beginning to properly understand our own planet. Mars is too far
away in time and money to refocus our effort away from earth.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): World-wide, real-time instrument network! The instruments are often
in place but without real-time or open sharing of the data. eGY and hGY
are important for the future of Space Weather. Thest networks should be
widely distributed (ie., oceans too) and composed of inexpensive
instruments. Expensive instruments at single sites are of limited used
for space weather.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): NSWP support of a realtime CEDAR DATABASE for active participation
in eGY for investigators to be directly involved in real-time data
assimilation (which is vastly more difficult than post-processing of
data ingest into models.)

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): The funding sources for space reasearch from the Air Force, NASA
and Navy have shrunk dramatically in the last couple of years. NSF is
now overwhelmed with proposals to support the science community. NSWP
should encourage continued broad agency funding.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Vince Eccles, Researcher

Space Environment Corporation

Providence, Utah 84332

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): vince.eccles@spacenv.com

**Response 30 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Both civilian and military; system design and planning, operations,
problem analysis; commercial.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): More emphasis, and funding, needs to be put on deployment of
instrument (ground and space), collection of the data at central
facilities and quality control in near real-time. Data must be available
to civilian as well as military. Focus on ionospheric observations,
scintillation observations specifically.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Few. End-users I talk to see this program as, in the words of one
of them, \"welfare for whitecoats.\" They need help now, not a decade
from now.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Too much emphasis on basic research and too little on developing
data sources and simple tools and techniques that might not be research
grade but meet user needs today, not 10 years in the future.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes, collect more data.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): Collect more data.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): I cannot overemphasize the negative impact of lack of reliable
real-time data from most of the world on commercial space weather
activities. This is the #1 problem that is not being addressed, or is
inadequately addressed, by the NSWP to date. Problem #2 is the lack of
demonstrated improvements with clear, and independent, assessments of
the quantitative accuracy and shortfalls of these improvements, in
ionospheric specification and short-term forecasting, much of which
suffers greatly from lack of data (see problem #1).

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Jim Secan

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): jim@nwra.com

**Response 31 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): civilian research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Roles are appropriately focused on research

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Heliospheric and magnetospheric imaging are the big successes.
These combined with credible global simulations have created the
beginnings of an operational support capability. MMS development will
support microphysical studies that are needed beyond the auroral zone.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Lack of DOD or NOAA initiative in operational monitoring the solar
wind upstream of Earth.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Need to continue imaging but also create station networks to study
the system at meso to global scales.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): N/A

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Greater emphasis needed on operational safety for spacecraft and
astronauts. NASA will have to shoulder some of this applicable to
travels away from the Earth-Moon system, but not for some time.
Meanwhile DOD and NOAA should be more active in Geospace operations.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Operational monitoring of upstream solar wind conditions.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): For the most part, it is. However, continuing efforts to provide
materials for use in

schools are important so that classes reflect actual practice in the
outside world.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Podcasting might be highly appropriate for this, along with
internet space weather sites.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): We need to make the beginnings of a transition to operations in
Geospace, with dedicated, permanent upstream monitoring.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): None

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Thomas E Moore

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): thomas.e.moore@nasa.gov

**Response 32 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Done with military assets, but focused on basic research.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Since NWSP is an NSF-funded activity, some of the most important
agencies have a hard time participating. For example, LANL is classified
as an FFRDC, but space weather research is not funded at LANL at all.
Although LANL has the worlds best and most comprehensive datasets for SW
applications and research, we are essentially shut out of doing the
research. This is not a practical way to implement NSWP.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Im not aware of any off the top of my head. The NSWP is not
something we think about all that much here at LANL anymore. Although we
have had some funding in the past, it no longer seems practical to
pursue NSWP funding here. We do most of our space weather research
through NASA (e.g. LWS).

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Allow other FFRDCs to participate more easily.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): The president's new vision should not change the priorities of
NSWP at all. SW is just as important for military and civilian assets as
ever.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Don't know.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Allow the most appropriate institutions to fully participate in it!

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 33 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): research (military & civil), design (military & civil), military
operations to include NRO

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Primary role: SW specification Secondary role: Modeling and
Forecasting. No role at all for operations, design and development by
NASA/NSF supported efforts

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Most successful efforts relative to operations and design have been
the NSWP efforts of NOAA/SEL, AFRL and FFRDC\'s

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Major weakness is to move NASA/NSF results into the engineering
community where it can have real impact on space systems

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Need to focus on better coupling between NASA/NSF supported efforts
and the needs of the space systems engineering community. i.e. more
reality and real applications and less research tools generation
emphasis

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): yes - see 4) above

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Galactic cosmic rays and SEP events represent the greatest hazard
and GCR is well known and basically one can\'t do anything about it. SEP
events may be predictable in the long run and there is already a
sufficiently intense focus on those. GCR is ultimately the bigger
problem for manned interplanetary travel.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): My research is directly inserted at the level of design and
development of space systems and in monitoring operations because of
intimate contact with the programs themselves at the engineering level.
Wish more of the folks working in NSWP would do the same. Unfortunately,
neither NSF nor NASA feels that is in anyway their job. They \"do
science\" and leave the transition of the science results to others.
Unfortunately there is no organization that takes the transition task on
as its role in NSWP.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): No. See comment in 6) This is the real problem. At present, those
in the engineering

community that feel there are NSWP results that could be useful must try
to extract what they need themselves. It takes uniquely talented
individuals with a foot in both worlds to make this happen. A more
formal transition program is really needed to communicate useful science
results into engineering referenceable and usable results. (i.e.
actionable knowledge)

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Some organization needs to be identified and tasked with the
requirement to transition the NSWP science results into useful
engineering tools and data for space system developers

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Must of the NSWP research efforts result from work that researchers
were doing anyway but now have better source of funding for. The NASA
LWS program is one exception. The near term LWS program (SDO, RBSP,
ITSP, Sentinals) will provide new data with NSWP focus that have not
been available in such a targeted way previously. These new data will
provide a level of space weather characterization that has not been
previously possible. The NSWP should focus on supporting the LWS and
ILWS programs and using those data resources in their future efforts.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): My comments are for the assessment committee only and are thus
candid and reflect only my personal perspective on NSWP.

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 34 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research - basic scientific investigation of space weather
processes

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): academic community participates in both basic and directed
research.

On the basic research side - i.e. that funded by the annual NSWP funding
administered by the NSF, there seems to be an aversion to undertake
(community) and support (agencies and community review panels) research
that has an "applications" focus. This is counterintuitive, since the
NSWP should be applications-orientated. However, the community review
panels look on this funding pool as a means of furthering basic research
in the space sciences, per se. Direct funding of SPW projects by NASA,
through LWS missions and related activities, also seems to emphasize a
continuance of the (pre-NSWP) basic research projects, with the words
\"space weather\" added to the project summaries.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): success: annual SPW meeting in Boulder has encouraged interaction
and communication between the research and applications communities.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): see answer to \# 1, above. Funding for SPW research largely is not
being directed to support projects with a close applications emphasis.
Most projects promise a "long-range" enhancement of SPW predictive
capability - which in a 10-year program (as initially described) is not
really helpful.

There appears to be a commercial "buffer layer" between the needs of the
real customers (DoD, FAA, communications industry) and the research
community. Basic research innovation needs to find favor with and be
filtered through this buffer zone in order to be useful. There are DoD
programs providing direct support to basic research teams, but these
have limited exposure to the more-broad (academic) research community.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): It's hard to gauge national priorities in this area. Right now LWS
needs to focus on

protecting "man-in-space". Will this continue? What are the current,
real needs of the

communications and navigation industries/agencies?

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Basic researchers nowadays struggle to find agencies able to
provide the continuing, consistent support that an effective research
program requires.

New method: agility - the ability to keep a focused program productive
in a changeable funding environment. Academic researchers need to adopt
the mode of operation of a for-profit company - to go where the user
demand is (go where the money is).

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Basic researchers really have no clear guidance on the real needs
of the user community (see comments on filter layer, above). Hence,
guidance from the basic research community on how best to address an
unspecified target should be taken with lots of salt.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): someone with an accurate overview of these communities and their
needs would have to address these questions.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Honest assessment of user-community space weather needs - e.g. by
an NRC panel. Open and honest discussion of such needs by those
providing input to such a NRC panel is essential. Dissemination of this
information in a timely way to both funding agencies and the research
community.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): space weather research is very important, and will become more so
as the nation becomes more-heavily involved in the uses of space.
Continued support is needed.

Identification of areas in which basic research can make real and
necessary contributions should be a high-priority task.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): my comments are not confidential

11\) Name (optional):

A11): John Foster

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): <jfoster@haystack.mit.edu>

**Response 35 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The success has been to foster greater awareness within the
research community that space science is an applied science. However,
much work remains to communicate to the research community what are the
short term versus long term needs of the space operations community. For
example, it seems that opinions vary wildly on the prioritization of
three basic objectives: environmental specifications for design,
real-time specifications and forecasts, and sun-to-earth physical
models.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): To the extent that it is part of NSWP, for several years NSF/GEM
has provided a valuable forum for discussion of scientific and technical
advances. GEM appears to be the main forum for discussion of data
assimilative models, which are a promising avenue for connecting the
vast amount of physical knowledge of the space environment to its
potential users.

Another fine achievement was the LWS meeting of industry and scientists
to discuss new radiation specification models (October 2004, Washington
DC, proceedings in Space Weather special section)

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The user community is rarely specific about its needs. The industry
scientists are often left defining those needs. Since most industry
scientists work at FFRDCs, there is little direct information from the
commercial builders and operators of spacecraft. There was something of
a breakthrough at the above-cited LWS meeting, and the information from
the \"users\" was aptly dubbed the Oracle.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes. The Inner Zone is neglected.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): The situation seems to be that NASA is trying to retool in order
to be responsive to the vision but the budget increases needed to fund
the vision have not materialized. Thus, NASA is squeezing its programs.
It seems that this squeeze is temporary. Either the funding will be
released, or the vision will be changed by the next administration. The
dynamic environment is deleterious to attracting and maintaining a
talented pool of scientists.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): My research, per se, is already pretty close to the operations
environment. However, I know that more emphasis needs to be placed on
data assimilation. The magnetosphere is a system heavily driven by its
boundary conditions, which cannot be known completely (a single L1 solar
wind monitor is not nearly enough information). Therefore, in situ
measurements, of which there are an ever-changing variety, must be used
to push the physical models back in the right direction whenever their
assumed boundary conditions are in error (not to mention when the
physics are in error).

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): My firsthand knowledge is at UCLA, where the space scientists are
spread over at least 3 academic departments. While this means there is
some cross-fertilization among the 3 departments, mostly the division
has negative effects. UCLA and other institutions where space science
work is fractured, might benefit from funding to establish centers for
space science research within their universities. This would raise the
profile of the subject among the students, leading to better people in
the field down the road.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): I cannot speak to this one.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): The connection between various kinds of academic research and
\"Space Weather\" has been stretched thin. The delineation between Space
Weather research and Space Science research ought to be maintained
better when funding is dispersed. This seems to be only way to influence
space scientists to do work that might actually advance the NSWP goals
(as opposed to their own personal interests.)

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): Most of what I have said can be attributed. The part I have
reservation being attributed are those regarding UCLA. I would prefer
that that example be excised in any attributed version of my responses.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Paul O\'Brien

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): paul.obrien@aero.org

**Response 36 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research (civil, scientific)

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The research/academic communities have done an excellent job
supporting NSWP, providing crucial, new, exciting science that is
critical for prediction. In recent years, there has been an unfortunate
trend in which this relationship (which is an excellent one) has been
used to undermine pure science research. Space physicists like myself
have all too often been asked to \"justify\" our work via space weather.
I think that space weather is an exciting area that really resonates
with the public, and I am 100 percent in favor of continuing to support
it with my research. However, I hope we reverse the trend of justifying
space research solely on its applicability to space weather. There is
much more to space plasma physics than \"relevance to space weather\"!

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Most notably, the level of public awareness of space weather has
risen dramatically in the past ten years. Probably the most effective in
this area: press conferences and brief TV spots.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): no comments here

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes, I think that we should commit resources to continue routine
global monitoring

(especially imaging) of the Earth\'s space environment, to provide
situational awareness and space weather information in support of space
exploration. We also need to put some space weather imagers into orbit
around other planets.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): See answer to #4

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Perhaps I am mistaken in my interpretation of this question, but I
certainly do not want my research to be replaced by operations.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Expand funding to support a new generation of space physicists. And
here, I do mean scientists\--not just explorers! We need both for a
healthy exploration program.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): How about a space weather exhibit in the Smithsonian? Certainly
more space weather exhibits in museums. Dare I suggest a Hollywood
movie?

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 37 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Civil Research - I study the solar extreme ultraviolet irradiance
and its variations (e.g., flares) and the response of the ionosphere and
thermosphere to solar variations.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Successes: implementation of space weather research missions (i.e.
NASA LWS program), integration of models (e.g. CISM).

Shortcomings: launch dates for these space weather research missions are
several years away and overlap of these missions are not guaranteed,
major breakthrough in developing significantly better space weather
forecast tools has not happened yet (e.g., understanding the precursors
for flares, CMEs, SEPs probably rely on understanding magnetic
reconnection better)

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): Coordination of multiple agencies for NSWP is significant success
in integrating research efforts with operation activities. My research
programs concerning space weather have significantly expanded;
consequently, my programs have contributed significant new results (more
complete flare observations and new flare models) about solar flares and
the response of the atmosphere to these flare events.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Funding is limited and thus missions are not fully implemented as
originally planned. For example, there is no coronagraph on the NASA SDO
mission. Furthermore, NOAA has funding issues that might limit
operational satellites from having all of the space weather measurements
as originally planned. Possible solution is to obtain more government /
private support through augmentations to existing programs and combining
efforts more efficiently from different agencies. For example, NASA
could contribute instruments, such as coronagraph and/or airglow imager,
to the NOAA GOES-R satellites (versus NASA trying to fly all of its own
satellites for these extra measurements).

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Research breakthroughs on magnetic reconnection are needed to
accelerate improvements for forecast tools used for space weather
operations. NSF and NASA could combine research efforts to develop a new
research focus on this topic and other topics important for space
weather research.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Space weather operations is even more important now that NASA is
planning for human flights to the moon and Mars. Time scale for moving
research results to operational models is 3-5 years. With first human
flight to the moon planned for 2018, there is time with current NASA LWS
program to get meaningful results if the data analysis part of these
missions are well supported and includes healthy guest investigator
programs for each mission. Furthermore, progress could be accelerated if
NOAA supported / encouraged additional research with their operational
measurements, especially when combined with the NASA LWS-related
missions and research efforts.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): The techniques to measure the solar flares and model the
atmospheric response are well established and future programs
(satellites, modeling, etc.) for near real-time operations are being
developed already by NASA, NOAA, and NSF. Development of new forecast
tools appears limited, thus new techniques, such as in magnetic
reconnection, need to be discovered before significant improvements
might be made for forecast tools used by the operational community.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): No, it is difficult to find interested and trained scientists for
space weather research.

NSF\'s recent program to start space weather education programs with new
faculty hires is a good start to address space weather education at the
university level. Expansion of these and other new space weather
education programs are important to sustain the space weather community.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): NASA and NSF typically have EPO programs associated with their
projects. Do NOAA and Air Force have EPO programs? If not, then they
could expand the space weather outreach by supporting / encouraging EPO
activities.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): Feel free to contact me for additional information. I\'m very
interested and involved in space weather research (e.g., NASA TIMED,
NASA SDO, NOAA GOES) and am committed to taking the research results to
the next level needed for space weather operations.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Tom Woods

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): <tom.woods@lasp.colorado.edu>

**Response 38 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): research (civil, military)

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): the role is basically to support, put in perspective, teach, and
disseminate the

results claimed. Unfortunately, not many successes can be counted\...

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): doesn\'t look so good to me

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): support for long-term studies, for preservation and use of
historical data.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4):

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Leif Svalgaard

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12)

**Response 39 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The academic community should take a leading role in developing an
understanding of the important physical processes underlying space
weather phenomena. The community has done much to map out and describe
space weather phenomena. A notable recent success is the discovery of
the large amplitude Alfven waves that appear to play a critical role in
auroral electron acceleration. The most significant shortcoming is the
community\'s obsession with reconnection and its belief that the
magnetosphere can be adequately described by MHD.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2):

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): There are no simulation models that provide any connection with the
aurora. There should be a major effort to develop models that at least
include ion kinetics on a global scale. There should be a multi-million
dollar, multi-year effort to be undertaken by a major national
computational laboratory. The academic community and the NSF GEM program
is too fragmented to mount such an effort. The desired outcome would be
a physics-based model relating space weather phenomena to solar wind
drivers.

Another problem is the lack of understanding of the sources of radiation
belt electrons.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Development of a global-scale hybrid code for the magnetosphere

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7):

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Daniel W. Swift

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): swift@gi.alaska.edu

**Response 40 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations,

military operations, commercial, or other? (Please specify).

A0): University Research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Academic research should provide the basis for physical models, as
has been done in meteorology. Design and breadboarding of new
instruments combined with research using the data. All should be aimed
at: 1) basic understanding, and 2) transitioning into operations.
Currently there is very little financial support for transitioning into
operations.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The most notable success is the observation of halo CMEs and our
improved ability to predict when something might hit geospace. SOHO and
the group at NRL have contributed significantly to this success. The
GSFC science and engineering capability provides an important background
for getting the job done. A strong combination of government labs., such
as GSFC, NRL, and AFCRO, working together with academia is important for
future success. Currently is seems to be government policy to destroy
the government labs.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): There are two weaknesses as I see it. 1) decreasing support to
scientists in government labs, and 2) no strategic plan to transition
from research satellites and models to operational satellites and
models.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): Yes, addressed as above.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): No, I feel the current direction for basic research is well aimed,
just a little weak in

funding.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Infrastructure needs to be put in place so there is an operational
center, such as SEC, with a budget to support transitioning. There
should then be money through SEC, to support post-docs at universities
who will also work with SEC.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Encouraging, and supporting, space weather scientists to
participate in K-12 education activities should help the national base
of understanding of space weather.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Same as 7

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): Progress in the last 10 years has been spectacular. Let us not lose
momentum.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Art Poland

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): apoland@gmu.edu

**Response 41 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Civil, NASA, science

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): Academics are very unused to metrics. They really don\'t know the
level of precision of their work. A lot could be transferred from
meteorology to space physics, should there be courses or reference books
that made the translation. The success in the past 10 years, is getting
the new generation of space physicists (say, younger than 50) trained in
the rad belt physics of the 1960\'s. This appears to have been
successful. The failure is getting a predictive space weather model
made. Partly this is a result of the training required to get up to
speed. Partly it is a result of focusing on small aspects of the problem
to the exclusion of the general solution. Partly it is a result of
physicist\'s attraction to new-fangled, gee-whiz numerical tricks (e.g.,
non-linear prediction filters, or massive kinetic codes) rather than
patient persistent progress in the mundane physics of the global
solution. Future efforts should focus on (a) analytic global
understanding (NOT more inscrutable computer codes!) (b) integration of
all the parts that are reasonably well understood (c) comparison with
data.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): As a scientist, the major success has been getting funding for the
neglected field of

radiation belt physics. I can\'t speak to the practical aspects of NSWP.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Progress has been slower than expected. I think I would make all
space physicists take a course in meteorology (maybe a mini-conference?)
Analogies from meteorology to space physics would be made profusely. And
in the end, a set of fluid equations derived that would frame the
problem. Then I would ask that all proposals use this framework to
identify where they fit in. The terminology be standardized. Some of
these steps have been taken, I am just not convinced we have a
sufficient percentage of space physicists on board yet.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): A lot of expectations are being hung on the recent NASA AO: RBSP.
It may turn out to be the breakthrough s/c data set. But frankly, the
archived data sets should be sufficient to make progress. I can\'t see
any other \"breakthrough\" technology or discovery on the horizon.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): n/a

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Very frankly, space weather is of primary importance to
astronauts, a s/c can just add more shielding. So yes, I think the
President\'s new emphasis makes NSWP even more critical than the merely
commercial aspects outlined in the beginning. Lunar exploration, LEO
assembly, will all encounter space weather environments.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): My own belief is that a proper \"meteorological\" model, with
fluids and forcing, should be in place to allow operators a 12hr, 24hr,
and 48hr prediction of the space weather environment. I cannot believe
that space is a worse problem than the troposphere, and we should have
the same level of capability there. Instrumentation of space is
obviously less dense, but scale lengths are much much larger. With a LEO
orbiter, GEO and MEO platforms, and perhaps an elliptic RBSP-type
mission, we should more than sufficient information to provide this type
of model prediction.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): I don\'t know that K-12 education would change much in space
weather. Nor do I

see a great need for a huge increase in college-grad school students.
There is sufficient

manpower existent to solve the problem. As far as educating the users, I
find they know more than researchers about the problem. Perhaps, if I
were to suggest a flow of educational material, it would be outward from
the big aerospace companies, back into the research arena. I spoke
recently to a Boeing engineer who addressed aspects of space weather
very relevant to s/c charging that were not in the literature, but
\"trade-secrets\" of the satellite providers.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Once the general problem has been sketched out, as I describe
above, I think there could be fruitful \"mini-challenges\", much as the
GEM community engages in, where subsets of the problem are addressed and
younger researchers challenged to compare their techniques. I continue
to look at the meteorology field for inspiration, and see where they are
continually discussing extreme events that models had difficulty with.
This approach I think would be meaningful, AFTER a global framework was
established.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): I am excited about the potential for NSWP to enable future manned
missions to Moon or Mars. I think protecting astronauts will be highly
beneficial to space exploration. If commercial and defense space efforts
benefit as well, that should be an easier problem.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): Comments are not confidential, but for reasons of conflict of
interest, I would rather not give my name.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): A NASA research contractor

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 42 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Principal activity is applied research for U.S. Air Force space
weather.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The academic and basic research communities are the source of most
major advances in the field of space weather. They help to determine how
the Sun-Earth system is connected. On the other hand, when these
communities try to create space weather products, they think in terms of
an ideal world where all data that they wish to have does indeed exist.
In the operational world, any data which arrives more than 2 hours
behind real time has limited or no value.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): There have been huge increases in our understanding of the
Sun-Earth connection and is methods of determining how the system will
react to events in the interplanetary medium.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): On the research side, the biggest failing is getting beyond the one
hour forecast available by using ACE data. On the operational side,
there has been an enormous amount of foot-dragging in incorporating the
new information obtained in the research world into daily products. A
MAJOR failing is the lack of emphasis on an operation spacecraft to
replace ACE which is really a research mission and will not be replaced
when it dies or NASA gets tired of funding it.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): A better, more complete space weather sensor suite is needed on
NPOESS or in place of NPOESS. The delays in the NPOESS program are a
scandal. An operational spacecraft to replace ACE should be in the POM
now so that its construction can start by 2009 and its launch can take
place by 2013. The NASA Stereo mission should be a higher priority. More
thought and effort needs to be focused on how to remotely determine the
environment between the chromosphere and the L1 point.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): The implementation of GAIM (Global Assimilation (of data)
Ionosphere Model) is a great step forward for the DoD space weather
system but it is being implemented too slowly and without understanding
that it just one step of many needed to get to a future space weather
forecasting system.

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): The NASA emphasis on going to Mars and replacing the Shuttle could
kill NASA\'s involvement in space weather research.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): The major stumbling block for transition from research to
operations is not techniques, it is attitudes of managers of the
operational systems and inadequate budgets for the transition.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): There is indeed a disconnect between the operations community and
the research community which is hindering transition of products from
research to operations. Education of priorities and needs of the
operational needs is part of the solution, but not the complete
solution. First the operational worlds does not fully understand what
its needs are and has not set its priorities properly. Also very
important, both sides fail to comprehend how difficult it is to do
transition from one world to the other.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): One method might be to form a study committee blessed by the
highest levels of NASA, NSF, NAS, NOAA and DoD to critically study the
problems in transitioning from research to operations. I suggest support
from a high level because the committee need to be able to critique
everything and not be told that there are sacred cows such as NPOESS
which cannot be criticized. The committee making this assessment may
feel that it has such a role to play. However, I wonder if anything this
committee will say will be taken seriously at the high levels of
government where real action has to start.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): It seems that the NSWP stands at a crossroads between a glorious
future and total collapse. To stand around and do nothing will insure a
drift toward total collapse.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): These comments are my personal observations and are not official
comments. Technically, I should have prepared by responses for review by
my management but I didn't. If I had, I think that would have defeated
the purpose of this survey.

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): frederick.rich@hanscom.af.mil

**Response 43 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): civil research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The scientific community appears to have responded well to the
opportunities and challenges of the NASA/LWS program, by developing
research ideas that clearly contribute to understanding of the space
weather system and to the need to bridge the gaps between the various
disciplines involved. In contrast, the expectations of the funding and
user agencies at times appear overly optimistic, and the selection of
high-priority research themes do not always reflect where the main
stumbling blocks lie, or where the longest-term investments should be
made in order to foster growth across the entire field at once. Rather
than by small, ad-hoc advisory panels by NASA or NSF, these problems may
be best addressed by broad community studies, much like the \'Decadal
Surveys\', but on a 5-year basis, with particular emphasis on the
supporting science

(observational as well as theoretical/numerical) as carried out in the
NASA and NSF equivalents of \'supporting research and technology\'

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The NSWP, in particular the NASA/LWS program, has increased
awareness of problems and opportunities of space weather as a system of
systems. In particular, joint multidisciplinary workshops have lead to a
broadened scope of questioning and understanding by the various
scientific disciplines involved.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The budget allocated to the research segment of the national space
weather program, particularly within NASA, is inadequate to enable a
fast and efficient advance towards developing the required knowledge and
transitioning it to operational systems. The main reason for that is
that the entire system needs to be studied simultaneously, while
resources are barely adequate for marginal overlap between at best a few
of the many areas involved in space weather. As resources can be
expected to continue to be limited, it appears that international
collaboration should be fostered and stimulated at every opportunity.
Excellent opportunities for that include solar/heliospheric research
with the Solar Sentinels and the Solar Orbiter, and geospace research.
Similarly, cross-disciplinary

collaborations are to be fostered, for example with in-situ and
remote-sensing instrumentation on missions to other planets or to
non-planetary destinations throughout the solar system in order to
improve coverage of the global Sun as the source of space weather,
space-weather propagation throughout the heliosphere, and its
interaction with multiple different planetary magnetospheres and
atmospheres.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): An obvious opportunity, thus far largely unexploited, is to
stimulate stellar astrophysicists to become involved in space weather
research. This is particularly important for the study of the long-term
variations of solar activity (from years to decades): instead of waiting
for the Sun to go through a variety of realizations of activity cycles,
stars other than the Sun should be observed to thus replace a case study
with a

population study. The limited activity monitoring currently carried out
for a few dozen stars should be expanded significantly and structurally
for many hundreds of stars over at least one to two decades.
Observations from ground-based observatories at visible wavelengths
would we an excellent start, but combined \'pan-chromatic\' stellar
observations including X-rays, UV, and optical would greatly expand our
understanding of the solar dynamo and of the response of stellar
atmospheres to magnetic fields.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Space-weather forecasting for interplanetary travelers requires
that we observe the entire solar activity belt from multiple viewpoints
to measure the 360-degree patterns in the surface magnetic field, as
well as the initiation and propagation of space-weather phenomena
throughout the heliosphere. The Solar Sentinels are an excellent
opportunity for that, provided that they are launched in a timely
fashion, and that they combine

in-situ instrumentation with multi-perspective magnetographic and
coronal imaging.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): Understanding of the acceleration and propagation of energetic
particles will require a significant advance in spatial, spectral, and
temporal resolution of solar and inner-heliospheric instrumentation. A
spectroscopic imaging mission is sorely lacking in the NSWP strategic
implementation plan for at least the next several decades; that
deficiency needs to be addressed as soon a practical, because
high-energy particle processes are among the highest priority needs of
the NSWP.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): The complexity and breadth of space weather science requires that
it be taught from undergraduate level onward. Universities should be
stimulated to take up this challenge, while funding agencies should
formulate a strategy for an (apparently) stable future for the
space-weather research opportunities which universities and affiliated
research centers will feel compelled to respond to.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8):

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10):

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Karel Schrijver

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): schryver@lmsal.com

**Response 44 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): University-based research.

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The NSWP has provided an excellent rationale for the importance and
broad impact of research in the upper atmosphere, and has motivated
renewed attention to a perceived maturity in our field. It also serves
to illustrate the useful application of the academic research in this
area given the established path for transferring the research to
practice. It is essential that the academic research community continue
its strong involvement since it is part of the success of the NSWP.
Motivating coordinated measurement and analysis campaigns has been one
of the strong attributes of the academic involvement. In my perception,
a very large effort has been focused on large scale models of the
solar-earth connection, and it would be advisable if additional effort
is dedicated to additional new instrumentation to improve our
measurement capabilities. Models and predictions will need better
measurements in the long term.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The most notable successes from my perspective have been the
coordinated analysis of the effects of large solar storms on the
heliosphere, magnetosphere and upper atmosphere seen as a fully coupled
system. The engagement of a large number of scientists in investigating
the development and impacts of these storms based on the available data
has resulted in major progress in our understanding. I am less familiar
with the transition of the results to practical applications, and have
not heard recent reports on whether the established metrics have been
met at the planned milestones. It is important to check these if further
developments are to be justified. An article on this subject in the
Space Weather quarterly would sure help in this regard. Another notable
success of the NSWP is the resulting motivation of the international
community to embrace its elements and work towards a global effort.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): Frankly, I have been a bit disappointed by the attitude at NASA to
distance itself from the NSWP. When listening to talks about LWS, for
example, the contribution of that program to the NSWP, and a recognition
of the other participants in the effort, is often forgotten. A better
commitment by NASA to the program and a stronger effort to work with the
other communities would go a long way to show better cohesion.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): There are many instrumentation programs, particularly ground-based
systems, that need to be pursued to add measurement parameters that are
currently non-existent. Measurements exist for the Sun and at 1 AU, but
the intervening heliospheric region remains without adequate
measurements, and if we are to succeed in establishing the predictive
capabilities that we seek, we need to fill this gap.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): Same comment as in (4) above. The needed measurements cannot be
achieved with in-situ observations, but must rely on remote sensing
techniques, either space or ground-based to cover the vast heliosphere.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6):

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): I believe that the Space Weather Quarterly has fulfilled well the
education role. Topical meetings and space weather week are also good
venues. At the academic institutions, the summer schools are excellent
mechanisms for education of students.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Museum exhibits are an excellent way to reach a broader public and
additional efforts to augment what has been done already is recommended.
In addition, more outreach towards our Congress would be useful since
NSWP illustrates the importance of research and its benefits to society
in an exemplary manner.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): My comments are addressed as input to the review committee. They
can shared without attribution to funding agencies.

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Joseph E. Salah

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): jsalah@haystack.mit.edu

**Response 45 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research (both military and civil)

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The academic and research communities have been the primary
developers of the models and instrumentation for space weather
monitoring. While these models and data sources have been useful, they
have been developed to conduct basic science research. They are not
always suited for long term operational monitoring. As the NSWP
progresses, the basic research, which is needed to support the NSWP,
will change for studying the basic chemical and physical mechanisms of
the space weather to the mathematical techniques to predicting a
strongly driven system. There is a

clear difference between meteorologists and atmospheric scientists. A
similar development is needed in the space weather community.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): The most notable success has been the development of the Space
Environment Center at NOAA.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): There is very little funding available for the development of
operational models or data streams. Funding is needed in order maintain
long-term data sources and further develop data assimilation algorithms.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): A greater effort is needed to develop ionospheric data streams in
the low-latitudes outside of the American sector. Also, more data
sources are needed in mid-tail (\~20-40 Re) magnetosphere.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a): NA

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b):

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): The main problem with transitioning research to operations is that
there is little support for updating and improving models and data
streams once they have been developed for operations.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): Not really.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): Course development for space weather at the college level.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9):

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): None

11\) Name (optional):

A11):

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12):

**Response 46 (new)**

Q0) Is your primary space weather activity research (military, civil),
design, civil operations, military operations, commercial, or other?
(Please specify).

A0): Research

1\) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?

A1): The NSWP has helped to spur the academic and research communities
from their former emphasis on curiosity-driven basic research to more
applied research and testing, which I view as a good thing. It makes for
better interdisciplinary research, and keeps researchers in mind of the
bigger picture.

2\) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?

A2): It is remarkable that the small amount of funding in the NSWP was
able to accomplish the above change in viewpoint. By far the most
success from my perspective is on the NSF side, which at least has some
funding available. Our research effort has benefited directly from the
NSWP, both through research funding and from simply placing our research
in a broader context that is beneficial. One benefit is that the general
public can understand the importance of what we do when placed in the
space weather context.

3\) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?

A3): The other agencies tend to say the right things, but have little
funding available except for relatively narrow focus such as isolated
MURIs. The NSWP would benefit from a wider availability of funds across
different agencies. Another weakness, in my opinion, is an over-emphasis
on modeling, given the extremely simplistic nature of the models that
exist. It is not that too much money is going to modeling, but that not
enough goes to actual measurements, observations, and analysis.

4\) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities or
recent research

breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?

A4): As builders of instruments become better aware of the utility of
making their data available in real time, the inflow of primary
observations is going to increase dramatically. I foresee a real need
for the operations side to come up to speed in using the new data
products. There is an \"impedance\" mismatch between what the new
observations and analysis will produce, and what can be translated into
operationally useful information. It is not clear to me where the
responsibility for fixing this lies, but if the research community and
the operational agencies do not both work on this it will reduce the
potential impact of the NSWP.

5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?

A5a):

5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?

A5b): It is certainly true that the Exploration Initiative will impose
greater responsibility on the space weather forecasters, especially for
global solar and heliospheric coverage when human travel to Mars is to
begin. Most critical for Mars exploration in my view is to understand
the process of particle acceleration by solar and interplanetary shocks,
together with the magnetic topology throughout the heliosphere. CMEs are
only important as shock drivers for that problem. For near-Earth effects
(within the magnetosphere), CMEs themselves are of greater importance.
This difference may skew future research directions.

6\) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?

A6): If understanding shocks and magnetic topology are of primary
interest, radio techniques are the best (and possibly only) way to do
this via remote sensing. (A giant constellation of in situ probes would
also be useful, but that is much too expensive.) The planned new radio
facilities (Frequency Agile Solar Radiotelescope\--FASR, Long Wavelength
Array\--LWA, and the space based Solar Interferometric Radio
Array\--SIRA) would be extremely powerful together. Of these, FASR has
the broadest relevance to space weather (since it covers broad solar
science such as coronal magnetic field measurement and CME initiation as
well as shock and magnetic topology), and would provide real time data
products of great benefit to operations.

7\) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?

A7): I have been impressed with the Space Weather Week workshops as
venues for bringing together very different communities around the space
weather topic. Other workshops around the world are doing similar
things. My expectation is that the exploration initiative at NASA (on
the human spaceflight side) is quite ignorant of the issues and should
be targeted as a priority. The recent Wintergreen meeting was a step in
this direction.

8\) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?

A8): At the K-12 level, more emphasis on space weather impacts on
ordinary citizens might be done. We created a series of solar and space
weather activities for grades 5-12 (through NASA OSS EPO funding) and we
have used these to train teachers at 5 teacher workshops in New Jersey.
Efforts like this are important and could be made more widely available,
but that requires greater funding in the outreach arena.

9\) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?

A9): I have made several general comments above. The NSWP needs a wider
and deeper funding profile, across more agencies, and NASA needs to
understand its importance to a greater extent. More
instrumental/observational assets are needed, for which the NSWP is far
too small to directly support, but it could play the role of
coordinator. The over-emphasis on simplistic models is a problem.

10\) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your submitted comments (i.e. are your comments
confidential, etc.)

A10): None

11\) Name (optional):

A11): Dale Gary

12\) Email Address (optional):

A12): dgary@njit.edu

**[RESPONSES GROUPED "BY QUESTION"]{.underline}**

**1) What have you seen as the roles of the academic and research
communities in the NSWP, including its successes and shortcomings? Are
these roles appropriate and what changes might be required in the
future?**

A1): The academic and research communities play the role of conducting
fundamental research and developing innovative products. These roles are
appropriate for the future.

A1): From solar perspective, two consortia were set up with focused
objectives, one

concentrating on modeling activity near the sun and the other on the
transit of eruptions from the sun to earth. For those of us not members
of these consortia but trying to do work in the general area, it is not
very clear what these consortia have accomplished. To this outsider, the
latter group has achieved some success but the former seems less
successful. Institutions such as mine are not included in these
consortia and have seen support for space weather research decline. My
cynical experience with consortia is that the resources are unevenly
spread among the members with the bulk going to one or two members. The
idea of concentrating available resources in a small group should be
reexamined if results fall short of promises. Perhaps a more inclusive
research structure might be examined. On the other hand, if funding is
very limited, then it should be concentrated in one or two groups so
that a critical mass can be built in at least one institution. In this
case, some small amount of funding should also be spent on really good
ideas from other groups. Replacing the upcoming retirement wave should
get some attention; few young people are going into this research area.

A1): As I see it, this is a closed \"club\" of insiders who control
funding, evaluations and

publications. There appears to be little or no entry point for one who
is not already part

of the \"in-group\" of controllers-to-their-own-benefit.

A1): My current contract employment is with the University of Colorado,
CIRES; my office is in NOAA/NGDC, and I \"see\" CIRES mainly by email.
In NGDC and other parts of NOAA, especially the Space Environment
Center, there is intense and continuous (and entirely appropriate)
consciousness of the NSWP. In CIRES there seems to be virtually no such
consciousness among its management, although a few individual scientists
are notable exceptions. The transfer of NOAA\'s SEC into the NWS is (and
is seen as) a major step toward a unifying concept of terrestrial
\"weather\", with potential benefit arising for both sides, from similar
assimilative modeling activities, consolidation of observatories, and
increasing overlap of research areas. Examples of these are the effects
of severe (tropospheric) storms in the ionosphere, interactions of
ionospheric Sporadic E, lightning, sprites (et al.), meteoric input,
industrial and desert dust pollution, etc.

A1): Many many times. Of course! In the very near feature.

A1): In my view, the academic and research communities have been
\"rounded up\", as it were, with the large programs (CCMP at
Goddard\...a wasteful effort to get the community to work with others\'
owned/understood codes; CISM\...a good effort to

enroll university researchers in basic research with, presumably,
eventual real-life applications); MURI (a military copy of CISM); and
some NSF programs (CEDAR, SHINE\....all including much the same groups
in those already mentioned). Their

roles, to do space weather research, is short-sighted in that these fine
people continue to do their basic research and to publish papers as
usual\...but that have only tangential impact on operational problems.
Changes that might be required? In my view, shift some of the funding
for the above efforts (50%?) to commercial vendors (many of whom are
equally qualified but motivated toward operational improvements (equally
publishable).

A1): Roles: Academia has responded well with coupled models, which is a
large thrust of NSWP. Academia and the research communities have
responded well to putting model data and models on the web for easier,
more timely access.

The academic and research communities have not successfully developed
space weather centers, patterned after the weather centers such as NCEP
used for tropospheric weather forecasting (NCEP is National Center For
Environmental Prediction). This is more a programmatic shortcoming than
an academic or community shortcoming. An operational program of weather
prediction could be well supported in the academic and research
communities, if the program were started, which it should be. This is
certainly the case for tropospheric weather. Improving tropospheric
weather forecasts is an important and exciting area that involves
academia and research laboratories.

Note that CCMC is not an operational space weather center. It is a
prototyping center, and since it has no real-time data feeds, it is of
limited usefulness to effective space weather efforts. As far as I know,
CCMC has no plans to become an operational space weather center.

A1): No comment.

A1): This is an extraordinarily broad question. Please allow me to focus
on the shortcomings first. Shortcoming 1. Exaggeration and hyping of
some space weather effects such as the threat to power systems and
\"killer electrons\" damaging satellites. During the last solar maximum
very little of this happened prompting criticism from the

engineering community. Short coming 2. Technology and science have
changed rapidly during the past decade but organizations and bureaucracy
did not. The significance of ionospheric effects on navigation systems
is not appreciated at NOAA SEC or NASA nor is there a concerted effort
to help the FAA as part of the NSWP. My guess is that the FAA will not
even be invited to comment by this assessment committee. **(Please keep
this answer confidential).**

A1): We have learned to interpret historical archived data in terms of
physical universal

processes. This has made possible an extension of our \"baseline\", or
if you will made it possible to talk about \"space climate\". Climate
here being defined as the combination of long-term trends and frequency
distribution of extreme events. Both of these are essential to
understanding and predicting space weather. This process is still
ongoing and should be supported by preservation and digitization of
historical data and by sustained efforts of long-term future monitoring
of space weather parameters and drivers.

A1): 1) The resources of MURIs, CISMs, and other funding opportunities
should be opened up to include commercial vendors as part of the
research community. These vendors can make substantial contributions to
space weather research.

A1): The research community should continue to do what it has always
done: concentrate on performing excellent scientific research. The only
change in its role is that scientists need to be more aware of the
potential application of research to space weather operations. Better
communication with the operational space weather stakeholders is needed,
particularly through workshops and specialized publications.

A1): In my opinion the roles of the academic and research communities
are to develop new insights (research) leading to new tools
(applications) to predict the status of the space environment on a near
term basis (within the next month or so). Longer term predictions such
as those associated with the solar cycle are also important, but in an
analogy to meteorological weather, the near term predictions are what
was probably meant by the national space weather program.

A1): It seems that the academic and research communities have been the
focus of the NSWP and responsible for carrying out the majority of the
work. There seems to be less focus on the involving end user
communities. Who is responsible for engaging the end users? It cannot
all be left to the NOAA Space Environment Center, especially since they
face budget constraints and are understaffed for this huge effort.

One of the successes of the research community is that they have made
great strides in moving the field forward. Also, it appears that there
are more collaborations and synergy within the community.

Regarding shortcomings, scientists could always learn more about the
connection between the research, operations, and end-users.

In the future, funding for basic and applied research in space weather
will continue to be key to the program's success. Space weather has
advanced rapidly in the last decade or so, and I expect to see continued
success.

A1): Many breakthroughs come from the academic community, and the
research efforts at universities remain strong. However, most
universities do not take space weather as seriously relative to their
educational enterprise as, for example, weather on earth.

A1): Academia excels at basic research, and the non-academic research
community is broadly divided into two areas: civil and military.
Non-academic civil research is NASA-related research that is science
focused and similar in many ways to academic research. Military needs
have led to the development of captive laboratories and federally funded
research and development centers that serve military needs, at least
broadly, and these institutions also support military applied research.

Applied DoD research is an important element of NSWP. However, the
largest shortfall is the gap between the funding devoted to
space-weather sensor development and what is spent on using the data
from the sensors for improving space weather nowcasting and forecasting.
For example, far less funding is devoted to the Global Assimilative
Ionosphere Modeling (GAIM) efforts, than is spent on the space-borne
sensors than are meant as input into GAIM, even considering the fact
that spaceborne hardware is more expensive generally than modeling. This
fact does not adequately explain the differences in funding. Substantive
improvements to space weather forecasting requires improvements in
sensor and modeling areas. This imbalance of resources appears to be a
fundamental issue for NSWP.

Academic research has spanned a wide range, from basic scientific
research, to applied research such as prototype forecasting systems,
e.g. algorithms for predicting the Dst index. This is a productive
sector, however it is largely uncoordinated, and it is not clear within
the program context how the results of this research are to be
coordinated and

maintained, particularly after a grant period or initiative period has
ended. There is no centralized institution that will maintain the
knowledge and bring it forward into the future. The process of long-term
capture of space weather capability is largely ad-hoc.

A1): SPACE WEATHER HAS BECOME A SLOGAN AND A CRUTCH TO HELP SUPPORT
WHATEVER ONE\'S SUB-DISCIPLINE IN SPACE SCIENCE MIGHT

BE. PRIMARILY THE TRAPPED RADIATION BELTS OF THE PLANETS EXPERIENCE
LARGE UPHEAVALS, THE ATMOSPHERES TO A MUCH LESSER

EXTENT. SPACE FLIGHT BETWEEN THE PLANETS IS OF INTEREST WHEN GOING TO
THE MOON AND TO MARS.

A1): Successes: basic research can help establish the science behind
improving predictive capabilities. Shortcomings: To date, too much
emphasis on developing correlative techniques to fit observed time
series. These techniques tend to avoid or miss severe disturbances,
which are the costly events. Need more emphasis on accurately predicting
large disturbances (e.g., severe substorms, storms, atmospheric
heating). I suspect that small to moderate disturbances are so
ubiquitous that most operational systems are designed to withstand them.
To be really valuable to operators, I think that the big potentially
costly events are of major interest to users. The research community
should be more encouraged (by funding agencies) to address the needs in
this area.

A1): academic and research organizations like to study new things, not
necessarily solve problems for operational applications. Focusing the
academic & R&D resources on solving specific problems can work.

A1): The process has been half-hearted with far too many people merely
relabelling what they were already doing as space weather.

The solar, geospace, and earth science communities meet together all to
rarely and when they do they go off to their own sessions.

We have allowed a poor and misleading program (often politically
motivated) of research lead the debate of decision makers on the role of
space weather and climate change.

Industry and government agencies are failing to report SWx issues and
problems. NASA, for example, is trying, at best, to engineer it way
around SWx effects on the space exploration vision without committing to
fully understand the problem or, at worst, ignoring it and hoping it
will go away. They are betting the lives of the astronauts.

A1): MHD models have dominated; however, recently the difficulties
involved in investigating particle injection during substorms and storms
with MHD models have been recognized widely. In my opinion, global PIC
simulations have to be developed for the future. The computational
resources have progressed sufficiently to perform PIC simulations with a
reasonable scale. However, substantial support for this kind of research
has been neglected while MHD models have been supported. Funding should
be shifted toward kinetic models in principle, which provide particle
injections properly. All

scientists should know that MHD simulations cannot provide particle
injection properly.

A1): the NSWP has been largely invisible- even though it may be behind
many important

directions and activities in the discipline and space weather
communities, it is hard to see what is there simply because of ongoing
motion and progress, and what is really attributable to the existence of
the NSWP.

A1): Performing research on the fundamental physical processes in space
weather. This is an appropriate function of the academic community.

A1): The NSWP is coordinating the advance of understanding of how the
space environment works.

A1): Quality of the product has been enhanced dramatically since its
initiation of NSWP program.

A1): The academic and research communities have collaboratively advanced
the understanding and modeling of the many aspects of space weather. The
coupled solar wind - magnetosphere - ionosphere - thermosphere system is
a complex unit that involves physics on many scales. No one person or
institution can accomplish the whole task of understanding, measuring,
and modeling the whole system. Wide distribution of tasks is a good
thing. The group activities seem to be ever increasing in size. Is the
small group or individual being lost in the funding directions of
government agencies? Perhaps individuals are not effectively used by
NSF/NSWP? Perhaps CCMC integration of small group or individual efforts
could be showcased.

A1): More emphasis, and funding, needs to be put on deployment of
instrument (ground and space), collection of the data at central
facilities and quality control in near real-time. Data must be available
to civilian as well as military. Focus on ionospheric observations,
scintillation observations specifically.

A1): Roles are appropriately focused on research

A1): Since NWSP is an NSF-funded activity, some of the most important
agencies have a hard time participating. For example, LANL is classified
as an FFRDC, but space weather research is not funded at LANL at all.
Although LANL has the worlds best and most comprehensive datasets for SW
applications and research, we are essentially shut out of doing the
research. This is not a practical way to implement NSWP.

A1): Primary role: SW specification Secondary role: Modeling and
Forecasting. No role at all for operations, design and development by
NASA/NSF supported efforts

A1): academic community participates in both basic and directed
research.

On the basic research side - i.e. that funded by the annual NSWP funding
administered by the NSF, there seems to be an aversion to undertake
(community) and support (agencies and community review panels) research
that has an "applications" focus. This is counterintuitive, since the
NSWP should be applications-orientated. However, the community review
panels look on this funding pool as a means of furthering basic research
in the space sciences, per se. Direct funding of SPW projects by NASA,
through LWS missions and related activities, also seems to emphasize a
continuance of the (pre-NSWP) basic research projects, with the words
\"space weather\" added to the project summaries.

A1): The success has been to foster greater awareness within the
research community that space science is an applied science. However,
much work remains to communicate to the research community what are the
short term versus long term needs of the space operations community. For
example, it seems that opinions vary wildly on the prioritization of
three basic objectives: environmental specifications for design,
real-time specifications and forecasts, and sun-to-earth physical
models.

A1): The research/academic communities have done an excellent job
supporting NSWP, providing crucial, new, exciting science that is
critical for prediction. In recent years, there has been an unfortunate
trend in which this relationship (which is an excellent one) has been
used to undermine pure science research. Space physicists like myself
have all too often been asked to \"justify\" our work via space weather.
I think that space weather is an exciting area that really resonates
with the public, and I am 100 percent in favor of continuing to support
it with my research. However, I hope we reverse the trend of justifying
space research solely on its applicability to space weather. There is
much more to space plasma physics than \"relevance to space weather\"!

A1): Successes: implementation of space weather research missions (i.e.
NASA LWS program), integration of models (e.g. CISM).

Shortcomings: launch dates for these space weather research missions are
several years away and overlap of these missions are not guaranteed,
major breakthrough in developing significantly better space weather
forecast tools has not happened yet (e.g., understanding the precursors
for flares, CMEs, SEPs probably rely on understanding magnetic
reconnection better)

A1): the role is basically to support, put in perspective, teach, and
disseminate the

results claimed. Unfortunately, not many successes can be counted\...

A1): The academic community should take a leading role in developing an
understanding of the important physical processes underlying space
weather phenomena. The community has done much to map out and describe
space weather phenomena. A notable recent success is the discovery of
the large amplitude Alfven waves that appear to play a critical role in
auroral electron acceleration. The most significant shortcoming is the
community\'s obsession with reconnection and its belief that the
magnetosphere can be adequately described by MHD.

A1): Academic research should provide the basis for physical models, as
has been done in meteorology. Design and breadboarding of new
instruments combined with research using the data. All should be aimed
at: 1) basic understanding, and 2) transitioning into operations.
Currently there is very little financial support for transitioning into
operations.

A1): Academics are very unused to metrics. They really don\'t know the
level of precision of their work. A lot could be transferred from
meteorology to space physics, should there be courses or reference books
that made the translation. The success in the past 10 years, is getting
the new generation of space physicists (say, younger than 50) trained in
the rad belt physics of the 1960\'s. This appears to have been
successful. The failure is getting a predictive space weather model
made. Partly this is a result of the training required to get up to
speed. Partly it is a result of focusing on small aspects of the problem
to the exclusion of the general solution. Partly it is a result of
physicist\'s attraction to new-fangled, gee-whiz numerical tricks (e.g.,
non-linear prediction filters, or massive kinetic codes) rather than
patient persistent progress in the mundane physics of the global
solution. Future efforts should focus on (a) analytic global
understanding (NOT more inscrutable computer codes!) (b) integration of
all the parts that are reasonably well understood (c) comparison with
data.

A1): The academic and basic research communities are the source of most
major advances in the field of space weather. They help to determine how
the Sun-Earth system is connected. On the other hand, when these
communities try to create space weather products, they think in terms of
an ideal world where all data that they wish to have does indeed exist.
In the operational world, any data which arrives more than 2 hours
behind real time has limited or no value.

A1): The scientific community appears to have responded well to the
opportunities and challenges of the NASA/LWS program, by developing
research ideas that clearly contribute to understanding of the space
weather system and to the need to bridge the gaps between the various
disciplines involved. In contrast, the expectations of the funding and
user agencies at times appear overly optimistic, and the selection of
high-priority research themes do not always reflect where the main
stumbling blocks lie, or where the longest-term investments should be
made in order to foster growth across the entire field at once. Rather
than by small, ad-hoc advisory panels by NASA or NSF, these problems may
be best addressed by broad community studies, much like the \'Decadal
Surveys\', but on a 5-year basis, with particular emphasis on the
supporting science

(observational as well as theoretical/numerical) as carried out in the
NASA and NSF equivalents of \'supporting research and technology\'

A1): The NSWP has provided an excellent rationale for the importance and
broad impact of research in the upper atmosphere, and has motivated
renewed attention to a perceived maturity in our field. It also serves
to illustrate the useful application of the academic research in this
area given the established path for transferring the research to
practice. It is essential that the academic research community continue
its strong involvement since it is part of the success of the NSWP.
Motivating coordinated measurement and analysis campaigns has been one
of the strong attributes of the academic involvement. In my perception,
a very large effort has been focused on large scale models of the
solar-earth connection, and it would be advisable if additional effort
is dedicated to additional new instrumentation to improve our
measurement capabilities. Models and predictions will need better
measurements in the long term.

A1): The NSWP has helped to spur the academic and research communities
from their former emphasis on curiosity-driven basic research to more
applied research and testing, which I view as a good thing. It makes for
better interdisciplinary research, and keeps researchers in mind of the
bigger picture.

A1): The academic and research communities have been the primary
developers of the models and instrumentation for space weather
monitoring. While these models and data sources have been useful, they
have been developed to conduct basic science research. They are not
always suited for long term operational monitoring. As the NSWP
progresses, the basic research, which is needed to support the NSWP,
will change for studying the basic chemical and physical mechanisms of
the space weather to the mathematical techniques to predicting a
strongly driven system. There is a

clear difference between meteorologists and atmospheric scientists. A
similar development is needed in the space weather community.

**2) As seen from your perspective, are there notable successes of the
NSWP? What elements of the program have contributed most to these
successes? Are there measurable benefits to your research program,
commercial efforts, or civil/military operational program and, if so,
will they help justify future research and/or technology development?**

A2): The basic success of the NSWP has been to promote communication
between federal agencies involved in space weather.

A2): Mostly the same as in previous years, except in hype-labels and
\"program\"-statements. Different ideas are not allowed, for that would
dilute the earnings of the insiders.

A2): During my 53-year career, the NSWP ranks with the IGY as the two
most influential

programs affecting my field. Both focused attention and funding on
improved technologies. Today, these include: digital radio;
antenna-modeling-based design; science-based autonomous data analysis
with rigorous error estimates; the development of higher
data-acquisition standards; database management systems, etc. Much more
science, and more soundly-based societal impact is achieved per dollar
invested in the name of the NSWP than for the IGY although both are
notable successes.

A2): forecasting and predictions as well.

A2): Notable successes: continuous monitoring of the solar wind at L1 by
ACE. These data are essential for validation of Sun-Earth models that
have the potential for more than one-hour advance warning. Shortfall:
wasteful spending on solar sail spacecraft that would gain an additional
hour\'s warning. Even now, Wind, ACE, and SOHO don\'t always get
precisely the same data except for the exceptional cases of shocks and
CIRs; the nitty-gritty details are not important except for the
fundamental research that can still go on separately. That said,
Sentinels\...spotted around the Sun would be an excellent supplement to
the L1 effort that MUST be continued. The modelers\...those oriented
toward the operational side\...should be included as equal partners with
the experimenters in order to advance future research and technical
development.

A2): Successes are the development of the Global Assimilative Ionosphere
Model by AFOSR and ONR, but it is much too small an effort and the
impact will be limited until the effort is expanded. It has had limited
impact so far. Given the limited funding, the potential of this approach
is being undercut. There are also models developed by NOAA recently to
do TEC prediction in North America. I hear that is working well, but it
is also a very limited and rather isolated effort.

Fielding an operational space weather satellite such as C/NOFS is a
positive step. This came from the research community lobbying DoD. I
applaud the attempt to field a prototype operational satellite, rather
than another research satellite. Operations requires its own set of
skills and techniques, so scientific research is not sufficient to solve
the space weather problem. Fielding a prototype operational satellite
will help develop the skills necessary to achieve operational
objectives. Fielding only a research satellite will delay the
achievement of operational weather objectives.

Another notable success is greater availability of space weather data in
a timely manner

through the web. This has a positive benefit to research and operations.

A2): Yes, there have been notable successes, particularly in the
expansion of observational capabilities to monitor space weather
conditions continuously and in near real-time. These products have
commercial and military users.

A2): The most notable success is establishing that space weather is a
real, significant aspect of our environment that affects our technical
infrastructure. At the outset this was not so clear and now is accepted
\"truth\". **(Please keep this answer confidential).**

A2): The University of Alaska/EXPI "Fearless Forecasts" are a notable
success. These government-funded forecasts are distributed free to
whoever signs up for them.

A2): I have not noticed any notable improvements in our ability to
predict space weather and the effects on the environment resulting from
the NSWP. There have been many excellent research results, but the time
has come to put these results to the test of real time operations. Once
the various models are put through their paces in a real time
application mode over several months to years, the weaknesses can be
addressed by future research. (The predictions being done at Boulder on
the arrival time of an interplanetary shock does compare the arrival
times using three different models. I am not certain if any of this work
is funded by the NSWP. Neither do I know of a comprehensive comparison
of the various predictions made over the past several years although
there may be one.)

A2): The NSWP is an example of successful interagency and scientific
community coordination. I have seen an increase in public awareness
about space weather over the last 10 years. More and more non-technical
people have heard of space weather

and aware of potential impacts. This is probably due to the public
outreach efforts and media (although limited) exposure.

The Center for Integrated Space Weather Modeling (CISM), an NSF Science
and Technology Center led by BU, has proved that space weather is
getting the attention at higher levels in NSF. To have multiple
institutions come together to form CISM

demonstrates a synergy within the community.

The model outputs by CISM and the Center for Space Environment Modeling
(CSEM) at the University of Michigan prove that this field is getting
better at modeling, visualization, and understanding the Sun-Earth
environment.

In my current area of policy research, I find that as the NSWP continues
to make progress, more and more policy issues emerge. Right now, this
policy area is far behind policy research in meteorology or space
exploration, although there are a lot of similarities and lessons to be
learned. I would like to think that policy research will help justify
future research and technology development. This is one avenue of
communicating with policy makers who ultimately control the funding
levels and national priorities.

A2): There are notable successes in many areas. Many breakthroughs have
come from SOHO and ACE, and its connected view with Earth-based systems,
such as POLAR, SAMPEX and others. There are, in my opinion, certain
tools that have not delivered to

promise. I have yet to find a quantitative result from IMAGE, for
example.

A2): Successes are the development of the Global Assimilative Ionosphere
Model by AFOSR and ONR. There are also models developed by NOAA recently
to do TEC prediction in North America. I understand that is working
well, but both these efforts

are very limited in scope and funding. There are coupled model efforts
which are breaking new ground and will eventually lead to vastly
improved prediction capability (e.g. CISM).

The CCMC is a very positive development in modeling. It\'s scientific
uses are currently eclipsing its use for operational prototypes, but it
is serving an excellent function for space weather research.

Fielding an operational space weather satellite such as C/NOFS is a
positive step. This came from the research community lobbying DoD.

Another notable success is greater availability of space weather data in
a timely manner through the web. This has a positive benefit to research
and operations.

A2): NO, THE FUNDING MONEY HAS LARGELY DISAPPEARED INTO THE \"USUAL
SUSPECT\'S\" POCKETS

A2): No noteworthy successes so far. From where I am, it seems that
various agencies have not quite figured out what they really want to do.
It seems as though the agencies didn\'t expect real progress that can be
transitioned to operations to come out of their funded programs.

A2): providing data and expertise on the severity and impacts of
ionospheric storms is an area that could provide direct benefit. If NSWP
could predict time and location of iono disturbances (airports/terminal
areas), this could improve service to GPS equipped aircraft.

A2): No.

A2): CISM has been successful in providing global dynamics regarding
space weather. However, there are limitations because these studies have
relied heavily on MHD models. Recently, CISM has finally seen the need
for a kinetic model which can provide proper particle injections for
substorms and storms.

A2): See above. I see all kinds of progress- at NOAA SEC (e.g. space
weather week\'s

popularity and content, involvement with research model development and
transitioning),

at NASA (especially the LWS program and associated missions), at NSF
(e.g. CISM), and the DoD (the recent MURI space weather centers at UCB
and UMich), but it is not clear whether all this things are enabled by
or supported as part of the NSWP plans and

agency responses. It is hard to point to anything major and specific and
say \"that is

there because of the NSWP\" - but perhaps NSWP is behind it all!

A2): Quantifying the effects of the ionosphere and plasmasphere on both
civilian and military navigation, i.e., GPS, and communications systems.
The measurable benefits are quantitative estimates of GPS disruptions
from ionospheric space weather at high, mid, and low latitudes. This
wealth of data justifies future investment in ionospheric space weather
and its prediction using first-principles models.

A2): The NSWP has led to the understanding of geomagnetic storms \-- how
the solar wind plasma produces the magnetospheric plasma which produces
the ring current and spacecraft charging

A2): I think it is due to better communication among users, developers
and and researchers.

A2): The CCMC has become the show case for state-of-science models of
space weather.

Additionally, the NOAA SEC weather specifications have seen dramatic
improvement in usability and sophistication over the duration of NSWP.
Placing models at CCMC should be encouraged. Community models need to be
improved (MSIS, HWM, etc.) Everything is now proprietary. I suggest that
is not a good thing. The community models should receive funding for
improvements.

A2): Few. End-users I talk to see this program as, in the words of one
of them, \"welfare for whitecoats.\" They need help now, not a decade
from now.

A2): Heliospheric and magnetospheric imaging are the big successes.
These combined with credible global simulations have created the
beginnings of an operational support capability. MMS development will
support microphysical studies that are needed beyond the auroral zone.

A2): Im not aware of any off the top of my head. The NSWP is not
something we think about all that much here at LANL anymore. Although we
have had some funding in the past, it no longer seems practical to
pursue NSWP funding here. We do most of our space weather research
through NASA (e.g. LWS).

A2): Most successful efforts relative to operations and design have been
the NSWP efforts of NOAA/SEL, AFRL and FFRDC\'s

A2): success: annual SPW meeting in Boulder has encouraged interaction
and communication between the research and applications communities.

A2): To the extent that it is part of NSWP, for several years NSF/GEM
has provided a valuable forum for discussion of scientific and technical
advances. GEM appears to be the main forum for discussion of data
assimilative models, which are a promising avenue for connecting the
vast amount of physical knowledge of the space environment to its
potential users.

Another fine achievement was the LWS meeting of industry and scientists
to discuss new radiation specification models (October 2004, Washington
DC, proceedings in Space Weather special section)

A2): Most notably, the level of public awareness of space weather has
risen dramatically in the past ten years. Probably the most effective in
this area: press conferences and brief TV spots.

A2): Coordination of multiple agencies for NSWP is significant success
in integrating research efforts with operation activities. My research
programs concerning space weather have significantly expanded;
consequently, my programs have contributed significant new results (more
complete flare observations and new flare models) about solar flares and
the response of the atmosphere to these flare events.

A2): doesn\'t look so good to me

A2): The most notable success is the observation of halo CMEs and our
improved ability to predict when something might hit geospace. SOHO and
the group at NRL have contributed significantly to this success. The
GSFC science and engineering capability provides an important background
for getting the job done. A strong combination of government labs., such
as GSFC, NRL, and AFCRO, working together with academia is important for
future success. Currently is seems to be government policy to destroy
the government labs.

A2): As a scientist, the major success has been getting funding for the
neglected field of

radiation belt physics. I can\'t speak to the practical aspects of NSWP.

A2): There have been huge increases in our understanding of the
Sun-Earth connection and is methods of determining how the system will
react to events in the interplanetary medium.

A2): The NSWP, in particular the NASA/LWS program, has increased
awareness of problems and opportunities of space weather as a system of
systems. In particular, joint multidisciplinary workshops have lead to a
broadened scope of questioning and understanding by the various
scientific disciplines involved.

A2): The most notable successes from my perspective have been the
coordinated analysis of the effects of large solar storms on the
heliosphere, magnetosphere and upper atmosphere seen as a fully coupled
system. The engagement of a large number of scientists in investigating
the development and impacts of these storms based on the available data
has resulted in major progress in our understanding. I am less familiar
with the transition of the results to practical applications, and have
not heard recent reports on whether the established metrics have been
met at the planned milestones. It is important to check these if further
developments are to be justified. An article on this subject in the
Space Weather quarterly would sure help in this regard. Another notable
success of the NSWP is the resulting motivation of the international
community to embrace its elements and work towards a global effort.

A2): It is remarkable that the small amount of funding in the NSWP was
able to accomplish the above change in viewpoint. By far the most
success from my perspective is on the NSF side, which at least has some
funding available. Our research effort has benefited directly from the
NSWP, both through research funding and from simply placing our research
in a broader context that is beneficial. One benefit is that the general
public can understand the importance of what we do when placed in the
space weather context.

A2): The most notable success has been the development of the Space
Environment Center at NOAA.

**3) Where are the present weaknesses in the NSWP as you see them? How
would you suggest addressing any shortfalls and/or weaknesses in the
program?**

A3): The basic difficulty faced by the NSWP, in my opinion, is the lack
of numerical

statistical measures concerning the impact of space weather. Most of the
evidence supporting the continuation of programs is anecdotal. This is
true even of the published reports for the Halloween storm of 2003. What
is the long-term economic impact of space weather? Often times a report,
issued by the Brookhaven lab, is cited, yet that report is so
bare-boned. I suspect that what is needed to accomplish a more
comprehensive study is detailed recording and publishing of measures
taken to accommodate satellite, airline, powerline, communication etc.
operations. Yet, such information would be difficult to acquire, in part
because it is often considered sensitive.

A3): I DON\'T HAVE ANY IDEA WHAT THE NSWP IS DOING! WHY DON\'T YOU PUT
OUT A NEWSLETTER?

A3): Lack of alternate paradigm research. \"Anything beyond the current
bandwagon cannot possibly be of any value\" is the attitude of the
controllers of the club.

A3): I think the NSWP is on a good course. I hope for more NOAA funding
in the name of the NSWP, and not just to support the SEC; but there may
be the appropriate signs of that already.

A3): The major weakness is a fragmented modeling effort. The NSF GEM is
an example of a fragmented program with a veneer of coherence. The
prominent global-scale models all pretend magnetospheric plasma can be
treated as a conducting fluid. The models are based on numerical methods
over twenty years old and have shown very little progress in improving
our understanding of space weather. The space weather community is still
arguing over what a substorm is.

A3): from the collaborational point of view.

A3): I\'ve mentioned weaknesses above. Suggestion for addressing them:
(a) Include all modelers\...not only the present academically-oriented
groups\...in mission planning; (b) steer these combined groups toward
real-time operational efforts; (c) avoid, like the plague, NASA-type
oriented science-by-committee efforts as proposed by Living With a Star
proposals; (d) support small spacecraft mission with basic
instrumentation (plasma, fields, energetic particles) for the solar wind
monitoring around the Sun\...missions with equal support for model
ingestion and validation; (d) avoid huge computational codes with glossy
graphics that promote NSF computer objectives\....keep the eye on the
ball.

A3): The weakness is easy to identify: there is no credible national
program to address

seriously the \"weather\" aspect of space weather.

That is, there is no space weather center patterned after the very
successful NCEP and ECMWF centers for tropospheric weather forecasting
(National Center for Environmental Prediction; European Center for
Medium-Range Weather Forecasts). These centers acquire data and produce
forecasts that are widely distributed and used by the application and
research communities. There is a broad research community dedicated to
adding new data types to these forecasts, and a vigorous research effort
to develop algorithms and computer codes that improve predictive skill.
Effective weather forecasting is a discipline unto itself, involving
scientific research, algorithmic and operational aspects. Such an
approach, known to be successful for tropospheric weather, is almost
completely absent in the NSWP.

A3): Excessive effort is being expended on solar research. Although the
sun is the ultimate source of space weather disturbances, the user
community is focused on ionospheric and magnetospheric effects. The
allocation of resources earmarked for space weather should be adjusted
to emphasize the highest-value deliverables.

A3): The primary weakness is focusing on astronaut safety and ignoring
the safety of the US taxpayer. The program could achieve a better focus
by including representatives of the FAA especially those associated with
WAAS or LAAS. **(Please keep this answer confidential).**

A3): 1. Restrictions of MURIs and other major funding opportunities to
only universities is a major weakness. Commercial vendors can offer a
lot in terms of research and should be treated as potential contributors
to research on space weather on a non-discriminatory basis. 2.Protection
of the vendors' intellectual property rights should be included.

3\. Vendors should be included in the planning and implementation of the
NWSP as active participants in planning, research, forecasting, product
development, sales, outreach, etc.

4.NOAA, NASA, DoD, NSF, and the other agencies should expand the role of
vendors in all phases of their space weather programs. 5. A follow-on to
ACE is needed. The dedicated reliable space weather spacecraft should be
located at L1 in the ecliptic

plane. It should employ reliable well-tested instruments and technology.
It should optimize the return of relevant space weather data. It should
not employ solar sails, and it should not be located out of the ecliptic
(as has been suggested so that it can be a communications link for the
south pole, etc.).

A3): There appear to be four notable shortcomings: (1) Inability to
identify appropriate funds to transition a \"research result\" to a
practical and useful tool for implementation in a real-time operational
mode. These types of funds should

include funding for the person(s) who developed the model being
transitioned so that he/she is an integral part of the process. (2)
Inability to \"compare\" the results of one model against those of
another model. Each model is developed on a set of sample cases; some
models use one set of data while other models use a different set of
data. Unless the models can be actively compared with each other on an
operational basis using the same real-time conditions, it is impossible
to determine the success and shortfalls of each model. (3) Reluctance to
fund studies that will result in empirical or statistical models.
Sometimes these type of models produce better results than some of the
\"fancier, first principles\" models. A good empirical or statistical
model can lead to insights that can be used in future \"first
principles\" studies. (4) A comprehensive list of all models (and
studies) funded by the NSWP should be prepared and be available to the
public. This

list should include the following: Title of research effort, funds
awarded, result of research effort, and how this result has been
implemented in the prediction of the space environment. A negative
result is also important if it shows that something does not work (and
thus no further research is necessary). Perhaps the report of this panel
presently being prepared will list these funded efforts and the result
of each effort. (Note that I would not expect you to give the name of
the PI or the organization involved; however, a comparison of what we
have achieved in better predictability vs. the

amount of funds expended would be most interesting.)

I would not support \"more of the same\" research unless a specific
weakness in a model has been identified from an application. I would
definitely support statistical studies leading to empirical models. Some
individuals have the ability to identify certain related effects
although these same individuals may not be able to assemble the complex

mathematical relationships that may be associated with these phenomena.
I remember that Dr. JoAnn Joselin (who was a forecaster at the NOAA
laboratory years ago) once said that \"if a statistical model worked
better than a mathematical or MHD model, than I will use the statistical
model over a mathematical model\".

A3): From my perspective, I would say weaknesses exist with user
interactions and private sector vendor interactions. Also, I would like
to see more visible participation from the DOI, DOE, and FAA. Many of
the user communities exist within these

agencies, so more involvement would be good. There seems to be varying
levels of involvement with all the agencies.

How is the NSWP engaging the private sector? Are NSWP meetings open to
vendors? Are an adequate number of grants being given to those in the
private sector?

Part of the success of the NSWP is that it can claim the connection
between space weather and societal and economic impacts. However, hardly
any funding is set aside to examine the connection and pursue research
in this area. More opportunities should be made to engage economists,
social scientists, policy researchers, etc.

We also need a process for collecting and archiving a database of
impacts. NGDC has collected satellite anomalies in the past, but what
about other industries? I see this as a major weakness, especially if we
want to stress the impacts of space weather.

A3): There is confusion about the relevance of Space Weather. Do we
\*need\* space weather predictions as a Nation? If yes, why can\'t NOAA
get 100 M\$ to build a simple L1 observer? Why can\'t they even get a
coronagraph? Does the DOD care? The

disconnects between a very motivated research community and the apparent
National imperative to do space weather research needs to be addressed.
There is a tremendous disconnect related to the transition of knowledge
from research to application. From the outside it looks like a stack of
red-tape and nobody knows the way around it. In many ways a motivated
private industry may be more successful than NOAA.

A3): One weakness mentioned earlier is the mismatch between resources
devoted to space weather sensors and resources devoted to numerical
space weather prediction models (such as the GAIM model). Addressing
this mismatch is a matter of government priorities and re-directing
funding to maximize end-to-end effectiveness of national space weather
efforts.

A3): THE MONEY IS NOT SPENT ON TESTING OUT NEW IDEAS, BUT SEAMS TO GO TO
THE \"STANDARD PLAYERS\"

A3): Funding agencies and their managers need to take a more active role
in ensuring that meaningful and quantitative metrics be established and
that research programs address and be judged on the basis of those
metrics. The traditional \"science\" approach is not optimum (see item 1
above). The metrics should not be established by researchers themselves.
That is, the research community needs to rise to an externally imposed
standard.

A3): Work on predictions of space weather, such aas iono storms, to the
level of accuracy and reliability as tropospheric weather prediction by
the NWS

A3): Lack of coordination between the relevant research communities.
Little commitment by any agency (NSF, NASA and NOAA) to work together to
fund targeted programs or launch joint missions (for example: Why is
Triana still in a clean room at GSFC while ACE is showing signs of
failing?). An inability or unwillingness to actually produce a clear
picture of the economic impacts, if any, of SWx. Lack of public interest
shows the ineffectiveness of current EPO campaigns.

A3): Due to a single fluid calculation, MHD models cannot provide
correct particle injection which is essential for space weather. Only a
kinetic model such as a PIC global simulation can provide it and there
is no substitute for this model. Extensive research with PIC simulation
needs to be organized at a center such as CISM. Without this effort the
space weather program will not progress in the future.

A3): Weaknesses include lack of visibility. Lack of advertising as to
what resulted from its influence and actions. Also continuing major
holes looming - such as nobody

picking up on lack of future plans for key elements such as L1
interplanetary in-situ

monitors and earth-orbiting or L1 coronagraphs after SOHO. Also NOAA
still does not

seem to sufficiently invest in transitioning research to operations. The
DoD space

weather enterprise seems confusing and unsettled to an outsider-likely
due to the fact

that it is a relatively invisible (and less peer-reviewed) program.

A3): Space weather operational effects on both civilian and military
systems are not understood in the academic research community.
Consequently research objectives can not be focussed in the right
direction.

A3): No shortfalls. Keep up the work so more progress can be made.

A3): Networking and customer service are the major shortfall among
developer and delivery.

A3): The available of real-time data for models to produce space weather
specification and forecasts is only now becoming possible. This is the
next effort required of the NSWP, that is, emphasis on real-time data
streams for modeling with data assimilation to improve specifications
and forecasts. The program should not consider its mission complete
until \'real-time\' becomes widely used in all aspects of the Space
Weather program.

A3): Too much emphasis on basic research and too little on developing
data sources and simple tools and techniques that might not be research
grade but meet user needs today, not 10 years in the future.

A3): Lack of DOD or NOAA initiative in operational monitoring the solar
wind upstream of Earth.

A3): Allow other FFRDCs to participate more easily.

A3): Major weakness is to move NASA/NSF results into the engineering
community where it can have real impact on space systems

A3): see answer to \# 1, above. Funding for SPW research largely is not
being directed to support projects with a close applications emphasis.
Most projects promise a "long-range" enhancement of SPW predictive
capability - which in a 10-year program (as initially described) is not
really helpful. There appears to be a commercial "buffer layer" between
the needs of the real customers (DoD, FAA, communications industry) and
the research community. Basic research innovation needs to find favor
with and be filtered through this buffer zone in order to be useful.
There are DoD programs providing direct support to basic research teams,
but these have limited exposure to the more-broad (academic) research
community.

A3): The user community is rarely specific about its needs. The industry
scientists are often left defining those needs. Since most industry
scientists work at FFRDCs, there is little direct information from the
commercial builders and operators of spacecraft. There was something of
a breakthrough at the above-cited LWS meeting, and the information from
the \"users\" was aptly dubbed the Oracle.

A3): no comments here

A3): Funding is limited and thus missions are not fully implemented as
originally planned. For example, there is no coronagraph on the NASA SDO
mission. Furthermore, NOAA has funding issues that might limit
operational satellites from having all of the space weather measurements
as originally planned. Possible solution is to obtain more government /
private support through augmentations to existing programs and combining
efforts more efficiently from different agencies. For example, NASA
could contribute instruments, such as coronagraph and/or airglow imager,
to the NOAA GOES-R satellites (versus NASA trying to fly all of its own
satellites for these extra measurements).

A3): support for long-term studies, for preservation and use of
historical data.

A3): There are no simulation models that provide any connection with the
aurora. There should be a major effort to develop models that at least
include ion kinetics on a global scale. There should be a multi-million
dollar, multi-year effort to be undertaken by a major national
computational laboratory. The academic community and the NSF GEM program
is too fragmented to mount such an effort. The desired outcome would be
a physics-based model relating space weather phenomena to solar wind
drivers.

Another problem is the lack of understanding of the sources of radiation
belt electrons.

A3): There are two weaknesses as I see it. 1) decreasing support to
scientists in government labs, and 2) no strategic plan to transition
from research satellites and models to operational satellites and
models.

A3): Progress has been slower than expected. I think I would make all
space physicists take a course in meteorology (maybe a mini-conference?)
Analogies from meteorology to space physics would be made profusely. And
in the end, a set of fluid equations derived that would frame the
problem. Then I would ask that all proposals use this framework to
identify where they fit in. The terminology be standardized. Some of
these steps have been taken, I am just not convinced we have a
sufficient percentage of space physicists on board yet.

A3): On the research side, the biggest failing is getting beyond the one
hour forecast available by using ACE data. On the operational side,
there has been an enormous amount of foot-dragging in incorporating the
new information obtained in the research world into daily products. A
MAJOR failing is the lack of emphasis on an operation spacecraft to
replace ACE which is really a research mission and will not be replaced
when it dies or NASA gets tired of funding it.

A3): The budget allocated to the research segment of the national space
weather program, particularly within NASA, is inadequate to enable a
fast and efficient advance towards developing the required knowledge and
transitioning it to operational systems. The main reason for that is
that the entire system needs to be studied simultaneously, while
resources are barely adequate for marginal overlap between at best a few
of the many areas involved in space weather. As resources can be
expected to continue to be limited, it appears that international
collaboration should be fostered and stimulated at every opportunity.
Excellent opportunities for that include solar/heliospheric research
with the Solar Sentinels and the Solar Orbiter, and geospace research.
Similarly, cross-disciplinary

collaborations are to be fostered, for example with in-situ and
remote-sensing instrumentation on missions to other planets or to
non-planetary destinations throughout the solar system in order to
improve coverage of the global Sun as the source of space weather,
space-weather propagation throughout the heliosphere, and its
interaction with multiple different planetary magnetospheres and
atmospheres.

A3): Frankly, I have been a bit disappointed by the attitude at NASA to
distance itself from the NSWP. When listening to talks about LWS, for
example, the contribution of that program to the NSWP, and a recognition
of the other participants in the effort, is often forgotten. A better
commitment by NASA to the program and a stronger effort to work with the
other communities would go a long way to show better cohesion.

A3): The other agencies tend to say the right things, but have little
funding available except for relatively narrow focus such as isolated
MURIs. The NSWP would benefit from a wider availability of funds across
different agencies. Another weakness, in my opinion, is an over-emphasis
on modeling, given the extremely simplistic nature of the models that
exist. It is not that too much money is going to modeling, but that not
enough goes to actual measurements, observations, and analysis.

A3): There is very little funding available for the development of
operational models or data streams. Funding is needed in order maintain
long-term data sources and further develop data assimilation algorithms.

**4) Are new directions in the program in light of national priorities
or recent research breakthroughs needed in the near and longer term?**

A4): Availability of regular mapping of solar sub-surface local motion
fields is promising

as a near-term forecast tool. High-cadence and vector magnetic field
measurements reveal significant and characteristic changes that may be
useful diagnostics of the direction and magnitude of B_z in an ICME.
Development of flux transport

dynamo models is very promising for longer range activity predictions.

A4): YES ABSOLUTELY. But how can an embryonic idea get a chance in this
stale environment?

A4): The \"Distributed Arrays of Small Instruments\" (DASI) concept
introduced by the

relevant NAS Decadal Survey needs to be recognized as deserving of broad
US Government support \... e.g., by NOAA, the DoD, DoE, etc. As noted
recently by John Foster, \"DASI may have already started\", insofar as
independent initiatives (LISN, as described above, for example) reflect
the advantages of the DASI concept. But the named federal departments
could and should take direct steps to improve global SWx monitoring and
modeling under the DASI rubric

A4): Progress requires the development of global-scale kinetic models. A
global-scale 2-D hybrid code (Swift&Lin, JASTP, 63, 683-704, 2001) has
show the generation of auroral Alfven waves and provided the link
between events in the plasma sheet and the aurora. A full 3-D ,
global-scale hybrid code is needed to understand space weather and to
provide a basis for space weather prediction. Such a project is likely
too large for a single investigator or university department. A major
national laboratory should be given the task. The continued piecemeal
structure of the modeling effort will continue to produce null results.

A4): Yes.

A4): I see no recent research breakthroughs. Enough has been done in
magnetospheric and ionospheric physics, via multi-spacecraft missions
and publications galore. Let\'s get down to the nitty-gritty forecasting
effort. The basic research will go on, but let\'s not support all of it
because the phrase \"space weather\" is used in proposals. This is

where the field has a bad name. National priorities? L1 monitoring, as
mentioned before; small spacecraft in the interplanetary medium around
the Sun plus equal emphasis (read: money) for the model verifications.
STEREO is a start but doesn\'t go far enough in this direction.

A4): New directions are needed to move space weather out of research and
into operations. The best way to do this is to create weather centers
for space as have been developed for the troposphere, and to integrate
these centers into NOAA.

To build a complex technical infrastructure, the accepted method is to
build prototypes. The prototypes are exercised, performance is assessed
and limitations addressed, and a new prototype is built that
demonstrably improves upon the previous one. Development continues in
this way.

Prototypes must be transitioned to operations along the way, and
performance of the

operational system is compared to the prototype. As new prototypes are
developed, they are integrated into operations, and in this way
operational performance steadily improves.

Performance is constantly monitored by the operational center.

The new direction needed is a path forward for an operational system,
which at this time

does not exist (perhaps bits and pieces exist, but not a full center
modeled after NCEP).

The operations program must be closely tied to a research program that
is capable of

assessing the operational performance and developing the way forward. At
the current time, there is no such integrated operational/developmental
space weather center with continuous live data feeds. Only small,
disconnected pieces of such a system exist, with minimal or non-existent
pathways for continuous development.

A signal deficiency of the program is the funding imbalance between
space sensors and

modeling. Tens to hundreds of millions of dollars over several years are
devoted to

developing space weather sensors that fly in space. Far less than one
tenth of that amount

has been devoted to the models that will use these data, yet these
models are essential to

achieving the desired results. This is a significant deficiency in the
program. If DoD/NASA and NOAA want to spend \$100M for space weather
sensors (e.g. in the NPOESS program), they need a commensurate
investment (\$4-5M/year at least) in operational centers that will use
these data to generate predictions. Producing operational predictions
based on data is very labor intensive. Please consult the budget for
NCEP to see what is needed. The space weather forecasting business is
obviously vastly under funded.

A4): Since most human vulnerability to space weather is located at
middle latitudes, the

program should be somewhat redirected or expanded to include the
construction and operation of permanent observatories in this zone.

A4): The national \"priorities\" are temporary as evidenced by the
wholesale re-organization by Griffin. **(Please keep this answer
confidential).**

A4): Science and services (and the transition) should be considered at
the same time in order to increase the pace of improvements in
products/services and demonstrate societal benefit.

A4): The program should focus on transition and feedback from operations
to research. Such connections would tremendously improve fundamental
research in this area, because it would provide specific value systems
that could be used.

A4): Yes! The NSWP program appears to not acknowledge a major government
program where space weather is very important: the use of GPS for civil
aircraft navigation. This use is part of two Federal Aviation
Administration programs: Wide and Local-Area Augmentation System (WAAS
and LAAS). Both of these FAA navigation programs for airspace
modernization are strongly impacted by space weather, and the lack of
knowledge of key aspects of space weather science has hindered the
effectiveness of these programs. Yet, there is no effort to address this
problem specifically, despite the fact that millions of people will be
affected every year when these programs are fully adopted, and despite
the fact that these programs cost taxpayers billions of dollars.

A significant new direction in NSWP is needed. It is specifically to
address the space weather needs of WAAS and LAAS, given the national
investment in, and wide use of, these systems. NSWP should address the
science that hinders the availability and utility of WAAS and LAAS. This
science relates to the formation of severe gradients in ionospheric
total electron content (TEC) over the conterminous US (CONUS), Alaska,
and Hawaii during moderate to severe geomagnetic storms. Significant
gaps exist in our scientific understanding of these features, which
effectively \"shut down\" WAAS and LAAS when they exist (assuming they
are detected!) and make the systems unusable for precision approach
landings, the main purpose of these systems. Of particular concern is
the possible formation of small spatial-scale, large-magnitude gradient
structures that might elude detection by the system\'s real-time
ionospheric monitoring network. Also of concern are the formation of
ionospheric plasma irregularities that cause scintillation of the GPS
signal and receiver loss-of-lock. The NSWP should have programs
specifically to address these phenomena, and should solicit input from
FAA on the impact of these phenomena, and how science can be used to
address the problems.

For more information about these programs, please contact Deane Bunce of
the FAA: 202-493-4725, deane.bunce@faa.gov.

A4): YES, GET SOME PEOPLE INTO THE DECISION-ARENA, PERSONS WHO HAVE NOT
HAD \"INFLUENCE\" DURING THE PAST DECADE: UNUSED

TALENTS, \"NEW BLOOD\", NEW THINKING.

A4): Yes

A4): Absolutely!

A4): Space Weather is something that should become more main-streamed at
this stage of the game- with space assets in place and an NSWP group to
have interagency dialogues, cooperation, and plans it can become a much
more organized and visibly successful effort if agency barriers are
dropped and everyone takes on their appropriate part. The NSWP needs to
develop a broad vision for what can be in place in \~10 years time-and
go for it. They will be critical for supporting any continuing NASA
version of the vision for space exploration, as well as for supporting
further commercialization of

space.

A4): No

A4): It should be a longer term.

A4): Support and integration of the eGY and hGY into Space Weather
program is required to accomplish future objectives. The space weather
system is a globally coupled system and requires globally distributed
datasets. International collaboration is a must for success.

A4): Yes, collect more data.

A4): Need to continue imaging but also create station networks to study
the system at meso to global scales.

A4): Need to focus on better coupling between NASA/NSF supported efforts
and the needs of the space systems engineering community. i.e. more
reality and real applications and less research tools generation
emphasis

A4): It's hard to gauge national priorities in this area. Right now LWS
needs to focus on

protecting "man-in-space". Will this continue? What are the current,
real needs of the

communications and navigation industries/agencies?

A4): Yes. The Inner Zone is neglected.

A4): Yes, I think that we should commit resources to continue routine
global monitoring

(especially imaging) of the Earth\'s space environment, to provide
situational awareness and space weather information in support of space
exploration. We also need to put some space weather imagers into orbit
around other planets.

A4): Research breakthroughs on magnetic reconnection are needed to
accelerate improvements for forecast tools used for space weather
operations. NSF and NASA could combine research efforts to develop a new
research focus on this topic and other topics important for space
weather research.

A4): Development of a global-scale hybrid code for the magnetosphere

A4): Yes, addressed as above.

A4): A lot of expectations are being hung on the recent NASA AO: RBSP.
It may turn out to be the breakthrough s/c data set. But frankly, the
archived data sets should be sufficient to make progress. I can\'t see
any other \"breakthrough\" technology or discovery on the horizon.

A4): A better, more complete space weather sensor suite is needed on
NPOESS or in place of NPOESS. The delays in the NPOESS program are a
scandal. An operational spacecraft to replace ACE should be in the POM
now so that its construction can start by 2009 and its launch can take
place by 2013. The NASA Stereo mission should be a higher priority. More
thought and effort needs to be focused on how to remotely determine the
environment between the chromosphere and the L1 point.

A4): An obvious opportunity, thus far largely unexploited, is to
stimulate stellar astrophysicists to become involved in space weather
research. This is particularly important for the study of the long-term
variations of solar activity (from years to decades): instead of waiting
for the Sun to go through a variety of realizations of activity cycles,
stars other than the Sun should be observed to thus replace a case study
with a

population study. The limited activity monitoring currently carried out
for a few dozen stars should be expanded significantly and structurally
for many hundreds of stars over at least one to two decades.
Observations from ground-based observatories at visible wavelengths
would we an excellent start, but combined \'pan-chromatic\' stellar
observations including X-rays, UV, and optical would greatly expand our
understanding of the solar dynamo and of the response of stellar
atmospheres to magnetic fields.

A4): There are many instrumentation programs, particularly ground-based
systems, that need to be pursued to add measurement parameters that are
currently non-existent. Measurements exist for the Sun and at 1 AU, but
the intervening heliospheric region remains without adequate
measurements, and if we are to succeed in establishing the predictive
capabilities that we seek, we need to fill this gap.

A4): As builders of instruments become better aware of the utility of
making their data available in real time, the inflow of primary
observations is going to increase dramatically. I foresee a real need
for the operations side to come up to speed in using the new data
products. There is an \"impedance\" mismatch between what the new
observations and analysis will produce, and what can be translated into
operationally useful information. It is not clear to me where the
responsibility for fixing this lies, but if the research community and
the operational agencies do not both work on this it will reduce the
potential impact of the NSWP.

A4): A greater effort is needed to develop ionospheric data streams in
the low-latitudes outside of the American sector. Also, more data
sources are needed in mid-tail (\~20-40 Re) magnetosphere.

**5a) For those respondents with primarily commercial or governmental
operational interests, are new directions in light of evolving customer
needs appropriate?**

A5a): There is far too little attention focused on basic infrastructure,
such as

magnetometer arrays and other data-collection efforts.

A5a): How often does one see the term \"Space Weather\" in the local
newspaper, USA Today, Time, Newsweek, the Atlantic, or in films? Hardly
ever, is my answer. Not enough is done to relate national expenditures
to the NSWP, for popular consumption.

A5a): Sure.

A5a): Absolutely.

A5a): See 5b.

A5a): No comment.

A5a): While not in this area, commercial and governmental operational
organizations should be willing to fund the transitioning of some of the
more promising results - particularly those that directly affect their
operations. Again, these types of funds should support the original
developer.

A5a): The NSWP should redirect to address evolving user needs. For
example in the case of aviation, many in the industry are concerned
about risks during high latitude and polar routes, which include
disruptions in HF communications, GPS errors, and radiation hazards to
humans and avionics. With more airlines increasing their use and
consideration of polar routes, we are likely to see this become an even
more growing concern. More agency collaboration is needed in addressing
these user needs. With my involvement in the International Committee for
Space Weather Impacts on Aviation Safety (ICSWIAS) I am aware that
airline unions are particularly concerned about health impacts from
exposure to high-levels of radiation on polar flights during solar
events. So, airline unions want legislation enacted that is similar to
legislation in the European Union. The EU has required airlines to track
crewmembers exposure levels and educate them about possible risks.
However, without more medical evidence, the U.S. airlines, FAA, etc. do
not want to discuss this issue. We need to encourage more collaboration

between the space physics, medical, and aviation communities. I
understand some NASA groups are looking at radiation impacts on
astronauts, but that information is not translating well to the aviation
community. The FAA's Civil Aeromedical Institute (CAMI) offers
information on how much galactic radiation dose is received on a flight
between any two airports in the world, however many in the community
question the usefulness of the calculations. This is just one example in
aviation. Other industries with their own set of user problems (i.e.,
satellite, electric power, navigation, etc.) could be better addressed
through interagency coordination.

A5a): NA

A5a): We support the FAA, which has governmental operational interests.
In our opinion, new directions are needed in light of the WAAS and LAAS
operations.

A5a): CANNOT TELL, BECAUSE OF LACK OF KNOWLEDGE OF ANY ACCOMPLISHMENTS

A5a): In order to assess high energy particle injection into the inner
magnetosphere, which is known to cause damage to satellites, a new model
has to be developed. In principle only PIC model can provide high energy
particle injection.

A5a): Need more emphasis on the development of first-principles
predictive models. This is major need in operational communities.

A5a): No.

A5a): I think it is.

A5a): Need for ground-based (or rather ocean-based) instrumentation is
required to complete the space weather picture. (but I am primarily a
researcher)

A5a): Collect more data.

A5a): yes - see 4) above

A5a): n/a

A5a): The implementation of GAIM (Global Assimilation (of data)
Ionosphere Model) is a great step forward for the DoD space weather
system but it is being implemented too slowly and without understanding
that it just one step of many needed to get to a future space weather
forecasting system.

**5b) For those respondents with primarily research interests, are new
directions/methods of doing research required in the near and longer
term (e.g., because of the President's new emphasis on interplanetary
travel)?**

A5b): Adequate funding for people to actually study the vast amount of
good data now being collected.

A5b): There is a need for small \"high risk\" awards, small enough that
the club-rulers

would not need to be so greedy, say \$25K per year as 3-4 month support
at a time, and so

that those who have many grants already are EXCLUDED !!!

A5b): This (good) question is the first instance I have seen, seeking to
link research

related to the NSWP to this \"new emphasis\". Personally, I totally
discount the value of an aim to visit Mars for the foreseeable future.
But I applaud a renewed lunar-station

initiative on many grounds including its NSWP relevance.

A5b): Both.

A5b): On the basis of comments above, yes.

A5b): The most important new research directions are related to applied
research: the

research needed to develop and improve space weather operational
systems. This involves a combination of scientific and applied,
operations-oriented research, including research into measurement
systems that must feed the operational centers. The research starts in
earnest after a prototype center is designed and implemented, including
live data feeds and operations-ready models. This is a rich area of
research that the nation has not yet committed to, but has numerous
benefits for the nation (the promise of NSWP).

Regarding the President\'s new emphasis on interplanetary travel, this
is mainly a charge to NASA. Not all national space weather goals should
be oriented along these lines. In fact, NASA has had to de-emphasize
near Earth space weather in favor of predicting Solar Energetic Particle
events to protect astronauts. This has led to a near abandonment by NASA
of near-Earth space weather missions. This creates a gap in the NSWP
that needs to be addressed by a coordinated nationwide effort.

A5b): It appears that the prospects for monitoring space weather by
satellite are

diminishing are a result of the Moon/Mars initiative. The development of
ground-based

networks of relatively inexpensive instrumentation and the exploitation
of commercial

satellite assets (i.e., GPS, Iridium) can help to fill the void.

A5b): Absolutely. We now need much longer time-period studies, and these
should include historic data (centuries) as well as statistical studies
(over the space era). We need to access, assemble (in a standard format)
and study many of the databases that presently exist; these studies are
relatively inexpensive when compared to funding a spacecraft to get
\"more of the same\" plus \"some new data\" simply to appease the
scientific community and/or \"appear\" to be doing \"something\". There
are some measurements that certainly need to be done and funds should be
allocated for those

measurements. For other measurements, we have almost 50 years of good
data (from the IGY onwards) and 40 years of spacecraft data that should
be evaluated to answer some of the questions presently being asked
related to a moon base or a mission to Mars. Operations on or around the
moon would be subjected to the same environment as that immediately
outside the earth\'s magnetosphere; the extensive near-earth space
measurements since 1965 can be used to evaluate various conditions that
moon operations would encounter. We know that the earth-based
forecasting organizations will be used to support those operations, so
success rates should be based on presently available data.

A5b): As I mentioned in question 3, more research is needed in the
economic, social, and policy areas.

A5b): An enhanced emphasis of the global understanding of the
heliosphere seems to be necessary. This understanding can occur through
multi-point observations and modeling efforts that are tightly linked.

A5b): CANNOT TELL, THE SPACE WEATHER FIELD HAS TOO FEW (WELL-ENTRENCHED)
PLAYERS. SURELY WE MUST GO BEYOND THE OLD

CONCEPTS OF STORMS, SUBSTORMS, TRAVELING-SHOCKS, FORBUSH DECREASES, ETC.

A5b): Yes. But, the new emphasis on interplanetary travel goes behind
space weather. Need shielding hardware for the astronauts.

A5b): NASA needs to draw the various research communities together by
only funding genuinely cross discipline research. NOAA needs to start
funding research into space weather to help the predictive capability
(not existent) NSF needs to put SWx on the front burner and create a
separate budget line for space weather. All three agencies (and DOD)
must find ways to discourage \"more of the same\" research.

A5b): We should strive toward realistic numerical modeling of the space
weather system(s)-along the lines of traditional meteorological models -
and put the models in places where new generations of researchers can
work to ever-improve them. We should have more than one major community
model to allow multiple approaches to be tested. These models should
include every relevant aspect of the Sun, interplanetary space and
Geospace. They should be used as exploration tools in Sun-climate
coupling studies. We should also strive to better understand how the
physics of the solar interior leads to space

weather effects. We should extend the meaning of space weather to
include the space

environments of other planets- both for what we can learn from
comparisons with Earth,

and because there is a goal of human exploration

A5b): No

A5b): No comments.

A5b): Turning away from the solar-earth system is not useful. We are
just beginning to properly understand our own planet. Mars is too far
away in time and money to refocus our effort away from earth.

A5b): Greater emphasis needed on operational safety for spacecraft and
astronauts. NASA will have to shoulder some of this applicable to
travels away from the Earth-Moon system, but not for some time.
Meanwhile DOD and NOAA should be more active in Geospace operations.

A5b): The president's new vision should not change the priorities of
NSWP at all. SW is just as important for military and civilian assets as
ever.

A5b): Galactic cosmic rays and SEP events represent the greatest hazard
and GCR is well known and basically one can\'t do anything about it. SEP
events may be predictable in the long run and there is already a
sufficiently intense focus on those. GCR is ultimately the bigger
problem for manned interplanetary travel.

A5b): Basic researchers nowadays struggle to find agencies able to
provide the continuing, consistent support that an effective research
program requires.

New method: agility - the ability to keep a focused program productive
in a changeable funding environment. Academic researchers need to adopt
the mode of operation of a for-profit company - to go where the user
demand is (go where the money is).

A5b): The situation seems to be that NASA is trying to retool in order
to be responsive to the vision but the budget increases needed to fund
the vision have not materialized. Thus, NASA is squeezing its programs.
It seems that this squeeze is temporary. Either the funding will be
released, or the vision will be changed by the next administration. The
dynamic environment is deleterious to attracting and maintaining a
talented pool of scientists.

A5b): See answer to #4

A5b): Space weather operations is even more important now that NASA is
planning for human flights to the moon and Mars. Time scale for moving
research results to operational models is 3-5 years. With first human
flight to the moon planned for 2018, there is time with current NASA LWS
program to get meaningful results if the data analysis part of these
missions are well supported and includes healthy guest investigator
programs for each mission. Furthermore, progress could be accelerated if
NOAA supported / encouraged additional research with their operational
measurements, especially when combined with the NASA LWS-related
missions and research efforts.

A5b): No, I feel the current direction for basic research is well aimed,
just a little weak in

funding.

A5b): Very frankly, space weather is of primary importance to
astronauts, a s/c can just add more shielding. So yes, I think the
President\'s new emphasis makes NSWP even more critical than the merely
commercial aspects outlined in the beginning. Lunar exploration, LEO
assembly, will all encounter space weather environments.

A5b): The NASA emphasis on going to Mars and replacing the Shuttle could
kill NASA\'s involvement in space weather research.

A5b): Space-weather forecasting for interplanetary travelers requires
that we observe the entire solar activity belt from multiple viewpoints
to measure the 360-degree patterns in the surface magnetic field, as
well as the initiation and propagation of space-weather phenomena
throughout the heliosphere. The Solar Sentinels are an excellent
opportunity for that, provided that they are launched in a timely
fashion, and that they combine

in-situ instrumentation with multi-perspective magnetographic and
coronal imaging.

A5b): Same comment as in (4) above. The needed measurements cannot be
achieved with in-situ observations, but must rely on remote sensing
techniques, either space or ground-based to cover the vast heliosphere.

A5b): It is certainly true that the Exploration Initiative will impose
greater responsibility on the space weather forecasters, especially for
global solar and heliospheric coverage when human travel to Mars is to
begin. Most critical for Mars exploration in my view is to understand
the process of particle acceleration by solar and interplanetary shocks,
together with the magnetic topology throughout the heliosphere. CMEs are
only important as shock drivers for that problem. For near-Earth effects
(within the magnetosphere), CMEs themselves are of greater importance.
This difference may skew future research directions.

**6) What new techniques, if any, are necessary to optimize the
transition of your research to operations?**

A6): Solid, sustained collaboration between research and operations
folks.

A6): CANNOT ANSWER THIS, because I have been excluded from participation
at the interface level, by lack of funding\...

A6): For question #2 I listed the new technologies which stand poised to
benefit my

research. I would like to answer the present question in, say, 5 years,
when these have had their effect.

A6): Fiber optics and information technologies.

A6): I\'ve discussed them above.

A6): The \"technique\" is development of a unified prototype operational
center that has

specific goals in terms of near-Earth space weather, and specific
methods to address

shortcomings in meeting those goals. The model for developing these
centers are the

tropospheric weather centers such as NCEP.

The needed centers are not modeling centers only, but include modeling
and real-time data feeds. Methods to improve the performance of the
prototypes includes detailed analysis of why the predictions fell short
(this often requires deep scientific understanding) and a notion of what
data are needed to improve predictive capability.

A unified operational center can accept new research results and
transition them to

operations. A true operational center is a vehicle by which new research
results can be

assessed in terms of their impact on operations. This assessment process
is the best

quantitative way to transition research results to operations and
achieve the desired

results.

A6): My research already relates to operations. Support for exploitation
of the dataset for

space weather deliverables is the greatest need. The rapidly declining
costs of computer and communications are making the cost/benefit aspect
of expansion of ground-based observatory networks very favorable.

A6): The CCMC and modeling efforts at places like Michigan and B. U.
have made space weather models more accessible to researchers and the
operational community. This is only the first step to making models
operational. There is still a need to take validated models from these
modeling centers and turn them into full operational models. The DoD and
civilian rapid prototyping centers need to be strengthened, with people
and improved cyberinfrastructure.

A6): Newer and faster computer technology has enabled me to produce
better models and made it easier to transition my research to operations
faster. However, many of the models being developed require \"super
computers\", and these are probably not readily available for
operational needs. We also need to be realistic about this. If it takes
3 hours to predict something that will occur within 30 minutes, the
effort is not practical.

A6): As mentioned above, there seems to be soo.. much red tape that many
good researchers get discouraged. An enhanced focus on private industry
may be more successful than changing the government.

A6): PLASMA, PHOTON AND ENERGETIC PARTICLE IMAGING INSTRUMENTATION WITH
HIGH RESOLVING POWER. THIS WOULD BE AN EFFORT IN VISUALIZATION AS WELL
AS EXPANDED DETECTION

A6): Mostly, funding.

A6): High-end computing for modeling. A single repository of calibrated
solar, geophysical, and atmospheric science data with easily accessible
catalogs and data retrieval algorithms. Including detailed explanations
of the data and its pitfalls (e.g., instrument papers, file formats,
etc.)

A6): Massively parallelized PIC simulation with real time visualization
on the largest available supercomputer has to be developed as a
complement to MHD simulations.

A6): continuing L1 information- plasma, fields, energetic particles -
WITHOUT LAPSES (may require an operational platform approach after ACE)
improved solar information- magnetic fields/active regions in the
interior- from farside field measurements and global vector field
measurements- including chromospheric vector magnetograms (e.g. added to
SOLIS) taken in high time cadence and with high spatial resolution
Modeling- further development of models coupling the solar interior
(dynamo models) to the corona. further development of techniques by
which solar data can actively drive coronal transient models, further
development of models that can follow the effects of solar/coronal
activity deep into the atmosphere (e.g. WACCM at NCAR)

A6): Model validation and prediction studies, in a global sense, of
quantities needed in

operations, e.g., amplitude of GPS fading during stormtime periods at
mid latitudes.

A6): None.

A6): If it delivers an real-time or near real-time product, it will be
an important improvement.

A6): World-wide, real-time instrument network! The instruments are often
in place but without real-time or open sharing of the data. eGY and hGY
are important for the future of Space Weather. Thest networks should be
widely distributed (ie., oceans too) and composed of inexpensive
instruments. Expensive instruments at single sites are of limited used
for space weather.

A6): Operational monitoring of upstream solar wind conditions.

A6): My research is directly inserted at the level of design and
development of space systems and in monitoring operations because of
intimate contact with the programs themselves at the engineering level.
Wish more of the folks working in NSWP would do the same. Unfortunately,
neither NSF nor NASA feels that is in anyway their job. They \"do
science\" and leave the transition of the science results to others.
Unfortunately there is no organization that takes the transition task on
as its role in NSWP.

A6): Basic researchers really have no clear guidance on the real needs
of the user community (see comments on filter layer, above). Hence,
guidance from the basic research community on how best to address an
unspecified target should be taken with lots of salt.

A6): My research, per se, is already pretty close to the operations
environment. However, I know that more emphasis needs to be placed on
data assimilation. The magnetosphere is a system heavily driven by its
boundary conditions, which cannot be known completely (a single L1 solar
wind monitor is not nearly enough information). Therefore, in situ
measurements, of which there are an ever-changing variety, must be used
to push the physical models back in the right direction whenever their
assumed boundary conditions are in error (not to mention when the
physics are in error).

A6): Perhaps I am mistaken in my interpretation of this question, but I
certainly do not want my research to be replaced by operations.

A6): The techniques to measure the solar flares and model the
atmospheric response are well established and future programs
(satellites, modeling, etc.) for near real-time operations are being
developed already by NASA, NOAA, and NSF. Development of new forecast
tools appears limited, thus new techniques, such as in magnetic
reconnection, need to be discovered before significant improvements
might be made for forecast tools used by the operational community.

A6): Infrastructure needs to be put in place so there is an operational
center, such as SEC, with a budget to support transitioning. There
should then be money through SEC, to support post-docs at universities
who will also work with SEC.

A6): My own belief is that a proper \"meteorological\" model, with
fluids and forcing, should be in place to allow operators a 12hr, 24hr,
and 48hr prediction of the space weather environment. I cannot believe
that space is a worse problem than the troposphere, and we should have
the same level of capability there. Instrumentation of space is
obviously less dense, but scale lengths are much much larger. With a LEO
orbiter, GEO and MEO platforms, and perhaps an elliptic RBSP-type
mission, we should more than sufficient information to provide this type
of model prediction.

A6): The major stumbling block for transition from research to
operations is not techniques, it is attitudes of managers of the
operational systems and inadequate budgets for the transition.

A6): Understanding of the acceleration and propagation of energetic
particles will require a significant advance in spatial, spectral, and
temporal resolution of solar and inner-heliospheric instrumentation. A
spectroscopic imaging mission is sorely lacking in the NSWP strategic
implementation plan for at least the next several decades; that
deficiency needs to be addressed as soon a practical, because
high-energy particle processes are among the highest priority needs of
the NSWP.

A6): If understanding shocks and magnetic topology are of primary
interest, radio techniques are the best (and possibly only) way to do
this via remote sensing. (A giant constellation of in situ probes would
also be useful, but that is much too expensive.) The planned new radio
facilities (Frequency Agile Solar Radiotelescope\--FASR, Long Wavelength
Array\--LWA, and the space based Solar Interferometric Radio
Array\--SIRA) would be extremely powerful together. Of these, FASR has
the broadest relevance to space weather (since it covers broad solar
science such as coronal magnetic field measurement and CME initiation as
well as shock and magnetic topology), and would provide real time data
products of great benefit to operations.

A6): The main problem with transitioning research to operations is that
there is little support for updating and improving models and data
streams once they have been developed for operations.

**7) Is education about the NSWP for developers, providers and users
keeping pace with research and transition activities? What new
educational priorities would most serve the needs of the space weather
research, governmental, or commercial community?**

A7): Very little about the accomplishments of NSWP is reaching the broad
solar research

community.

A7): Make SMALL grants/contracts available to NON-major league places

A7): No, I think it is not keeping pace. Why does CIRES\' close
association (via NOAA) with the NSWP not seem to make it more visible in
the UCB academic program? Perhaps NOAA needs some \"NSWP Fellowships\"
for graduate students, via CIRES. Similar remarks are likely applicable
to other universities.

A7): brain exchance and technology exchance.

A7): The CISM effort in outreach and educational activities is fine for
those interested in academic research. For the governmental and
commercial community, I suggest twisting the arms of the people who are
in the real time modeling community to provide their experiences\...good
and bad\...to those interested in operational, vis-a-vis academic,
activities.

A7): We need a NSWP operational center (modeled after NCEP) that
advocates for new research results that can improve its operational
predictions. The goal of such a center is to improve prediction, not
just in a narrow area, but in a variety of space weather-related

areas. The unified center (or a few centers) can properly take advantage
of the physical

interconnection of the various data feeds and models. At the same time,
the unified center

can serve as a focal point for the research community to rally around:
new data types, new models and new research results must find their
application through the operational center.

The operational center as a focal point of research is a feature of the
tropospheric weather

program. New modeling approaches and data types are continually being
integrated into the ECMWF or NCEP systems. If a meteorological
researcher has a new cloud parametrization scheme, it must be integrated
into NCEP or ECMWF codes to achieve results. This integration
constitutes the transition from research to operations.

Once the unified center is established, it has an important role in
educating the community about what the current level of performance is,
what sorts of improvements are necessary, and what sorts of models and
data are necessary to achieve improvements, obviously in coordination
with the research community. Operational, developmental and research
communities must be closely integrated. This is best achieved by the
operational center bringing these groups together and serving as a
communications vehicle.

A7): No comment.

A7): There is a real need for individuals with a foot in both camps, so
to speak, who understand the user needs as well as the science involved.
The impedence mis-match, both ways, can be so large that all information
is reflected. An outreach or extension organization to industry could
have substantial impact. For example we recently purchased a GPS signal
simulator (\$300k) for the purpose of simulating amplitude and phase
scintillations. It was delivered and set-up by two members of Spirent.
As part of the set-up process we created a signal that replicated
measured amplitude scintillations.

Seeing this for the first time the Spirent engineers expressed surprise
and then invited us to their next user\'s workshop to demonstrate what
scintillations are for the industrial community. These sort of
interactions could be much more useful if appropriately organized by
trained individuals. **(Please keep this answer confidential).**

A7): There are several new educational activities in space weather based
at CISM, NCAR, and other locations. Web-based space weather educational
activities are proliferating. I believe these efforts need to be
continued, but I don\'t see a need for any new efforts.

A7): I am not quite certain how to answer this question since many of us
talk individually to members of the \"user\" community. There are some
individuals who look and talk only of their \"successes\" and what will
be required to have a \"better success rate\". (Sometimes these
improvements cost more than they are worth.) They point to very
sophisticated models that many \"users\" cannot easily understand. These
users simply want to know if a new model will improve their operations.
(They really want to know if implementing a new model will improve their
operations by 5 percent or 30 percent

or whatever.) There are also many \"nay sayers\" that something \"won\'t
work\" instead of looking for ways to mitigate the various problems that
exist. Scientists need to make certain that the \"users\" fully
understand what can and cannot be done within certain financial
limitations.

A7): How do you release new results of space weather research to the
user communities? They do not attend AGU and only a few may attend Space
Weather Week.

University space weather curriculum should involve a discussion on
impacts. I have been involved in starting a policy course for space
weather students with Art Poland at George Mason University. We found
that the students really enjoyed this course and it helped them see the
connection between their research and society. I plan to offer material
to other space weather university departments so they can integrate
material into their courses. This will be expanded to include the
broader atmospheric sciences. The result will be a new generation of
space weather scientists who will be more effective in the policy
process and communicating with policy makers.

A7): No - because most universities are not taking it seriously. We are
also not seeing any hires in this area. Where are the needs?

A7): As far as WAAS and LAAS are concerned, I am not aware of how these
programs are being updated as to progress. It has to be realized that
WAAS and LAAS programs are for navigation, and do not have a \"space
weather\" research or operational capability per se. Therefore, the
space weather community must proactively educate the community of WAAS
and LAAS implementers.

NSWP should set up channels of communication specifically for WAAS and
LAAS, given the size of these programs, and how critically they are
affected by space weather.

A7): LARGELY THIS IS A PLAYGROUND FOR THE WELL-CONNECTED PLAYERS. AN
EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM WOULD BE HELPFUL, BOTH FOR

RESEARCHERS IN GENERAL AND FOR THE AMERICAN PUBLIC

A7): The user community should be invited to clarify and document their
needs to the government agencies they deal with.

A7): Most people don\'t know the NSWP exists.

A7): No, EPO is amateurish and ineffectual. We need a complete rethink.

Everyone seems to be concentrating on k-12 but the US numbers of science
and engineering graduates continue to plummet. Something needs to be
done urgently.

Meanwhile most of us are ignoring the general public (the ones who pay
the bills)

A7): Simulations models such as MHD and PIC need to be more widely
recognized in a systematical way.

A7): Space weather education options now abound- there are a number of
\"schools\", many groups like GEM,SHINE and CEDAR that foster student
development (though the students engaged in these groups need to have
cross discipline lectures on a more regular basis), HAO and LWS have
postdocs and fellowships. Virtually all missions and major

research groups have EPO senior members as part of their activities.

A7): Presentations from NSWP users on current issues, possibly at
national meetings, AGU?

A7): Yes.

A7): I think current level of efforts meets the appropriate requirements
on my research.

A7): For the most part, it is. However, continuing efforts to provide
materials for use in

schools are important so that classes reflect actual practice in the
outside world.

A7): Don't know.

A7): No. See comment in 6) This is the real problem. At present, those
in the engineering

community that feel there are NSWP results that could be useful must try
to extract what they need themselves. It takes uniquely talented
individuals with a foot in both worlds to make this happen. A more
formal transition program is really needed to communicate useful science
results into engineering referenceable and usable results. (i.e.
actionable knowledge)

A7): someone with an accurate overview of these communities and their
needs would have to address these questions.

A7): My firsthand knowledge is at UCLA, where the space scientists are
spread over at least 3 academic departments. While this means there is
some cross-fertilization among the 3 departments, mostly the division
has negative effects. UCLA and other institutions where space science
work is fractured, might benefit from funding to establish centers for
space science research within their universities. This would raise the
profile of the subject among the students, leading to better people in
the field down the road.

A7): Expand funding to support a new generation of space physicists. And
here, I do mean scientists\--not just explorers! We need both for a
healthy exploration program.

A7): No, it is difficult to find interested and trained scientists for
space weather research.

NSF\'s recent program to start space weather education programs with new
faculty hires is a good start to address space weather education at the
university level. Expansion of these and other new space weather
education programs are important to sustain the space weather community.

A7): Encouraging, and supporting, space weather scientists to
participate in K-12 education activities should help the national base
of understanding of space weather.

A7): I don\'t know that K-12 education would change much in space
weather. Nor do I

see a great need for a huge increase in college-grad school students.
There is sufficient

manpower existent to solve the problem. As far as educating the users, I
find they know more than researchers about the problem. Perhaps, if I
were to suggest a flow of educational material, it would be outward from
the big aerospace companies, back into the research arena. I spoke
recently to a Boeing engineer who addressed aspects of space weather
very relevant to s/c charging that were not in the literature, but
\"trade-secrets\" of the satellite providers.

A7): There is indeed a disconnect between the operations community and
the research community which is hindering transition of products from
research to operations. Education of priorities and needs of the
operational needs is part of the solution, but not the complete
solution. First the operational worlds does not fully understand what
its needs are and has not set its priorities properly. Also very
important, both sides fail to comprehend how difficult it is to do
transition from one world to the other.

A7): The complexity and breadth of space weather science requires that
it be taught from undergraduate level onward. Universities should be
stimulated to take up this challenge, while funding agencies should
formulate a strategy for an (apparently) stable future for the
space-weather research opportunities which universities and affiliated
research centers will feel compelled to respond to.

A7): I believe that the Space Weather Quarterly has fulfilled well the
education role. Topical meetings and space weather week are also good
venues. At the academic institutions, the summer schools are excellent
mechanisms for education of students.

A7): I have been impressed with the Space Weather Week workshops as
venues for bringing together very different communities around the space
weather topic. Other workshops around the world are doing similar
things. My expectation is that the exploration initiative at NASA (on
the human spaceflight side) is quite ignorant of the issues and should
be targeted as a priority. The recent Wintergreen meeting was a step in
this direction.

A7): Not really.

**8) What new and/or additional methods are needed to further NSWP
outreach objectives?**

A8): Suggest that people with major funding under NSWP give updates at
AGU and SPD meetings.

A8): DON\'T THROW FUNDING RESOURCES INTO THE PROPAGANDA DOMAIN !!!

A8): See my response to 5a. NOAA\'s SEC does get into the news on the
occasions of major solar and geomagnetic events. Hopefully, some means
can be found through its NWS affiliation so that more ordinary SWx gets
an occasional mention in the news media. Does the average citizen know
what part of the solar cycle we are in currently? Why not?

A8): observational methods and experimental applications as well.

A8): See (7) above.

A8): The operational center serves as a focal point for outreach. Many
outreach activities

should emanate from there, based on excellent visualization methods,
ties to educators and educational institutions, etc.

A8): Not sure but I might suggest development of a space weather service
that would generate visuals like those associated with tropospheric
weather as a way of making the problem accessible to the general public.
This could be supplemented with exciting space weather images, such as
time lapse photography of the auroral ovals.

A8): Commercial vendors could play a valuable, but so far unused, role
in outreach.

A8): The NSWP should be more proactive in issuing press releases focused
on space weather events. The general public is largely unaware of the
many space weather events that occur, even under quiet magnetic
conditions. We need to be as organized as the astronomical community in
publicizing these events.

A8): Oddly enough I think there is too much emphasis on \"outreach\".
\"Outreach\" is now just another buzz word that has become popular. The
scientific community should be advocating - at all levels - what they
are doing without having to state that this is part of an \"outreach\"
program. While many high schools and universities are encouraging
promising students to pursue a career in space research, we need to make
certain that there will be jobs open to these students when they
graduate. (I realize that I am probably in a very small minority in my
opinion here.)

We also need to talk to writers of various news and magazine media so
that a the general public is given a positive picture of the value of
the space program in general.

A8): There should be more of a focus on educating policy makers,
specifically Capitol Hill and the Executive Branch (OMB, OSTP, etc.)
When SEC funding was in limbo, a hearing was held at the House Science
Committee. Some staffers were probably

learning about space weather for the first time. It would be great if
there was an effort to educate policy makers. I understand this can be
problematic for government employees, but a discussion about next steps
would serve the community well.

From my experience with the space weather vendors, they would like to
have input into the NSWP. I know NOAA/SEC meets with the vendors to
discuss customer issues, but that is not enough. What kind of education
is being directed at vendors? There has been talk about a space weather
industry. Although it is not really developed yet, is this something the
scientific community wants to promote or allow market forces to take
their course?

There is always a bias in outreach that it is one-sided. Instead there
should be a process for allowing outsiders to have an influence in the
NSWP.

A8): No opinion.

A8): A specific focus on WAAS and LAAS, and possibly other Department of
Transportation programs (e.g. Coast Guard CORS program).

A8): INTERFACE BETTER WITH THE MEDIA, BOTH NATIONALLY, STATEWISE, AND
LOCALLY

A8): Let Congress know about the needs. Let operators know of the
availability of existing/future products and invite their comments.

A8): We need a national initiative of science education (not just SWx)
with the goals to increase american scientific literacy and increase by
30% the number of graduates in science and engineering in the next 5
years. Much more ambitious goals need to be set for the out years.

A8): The limitations of MHD models have to be discussed openly and new
models such as PIC model need to be implemented for the future.

A8): It would be nice if the NSWP could make a \"one stop shop\" of
links or a search engine that is geared toward all the resources now
available for space weather EPO (and research!). There is a tremendous
amount accessible on the internet-but one has to

know the right key words and do other complicated linked searches, which
may not be

so easy for an educator or interested layperson coming from outside

A8): None.

A8): No comments.

A8): NSWP support of a realtime CEDAR DATABASE for active participation
in eGY for investigators to be directly involved in real-time data
assimilation (which is vastly more difficult than post-processing of
data ingest into models.)

A8): Podcasting might be highly appropriate for this, along with
internet space weather sites.

A8): Some organization needs to be identified and tasked with the
requirement to transition the NSWP science results into useful
engineering tools and data for space system developers

A8): Honest assessment of user-community space weather needs - e.g. by
an NRC panel. Open and honest discussion of such needs by those
providing input to such a NRC panel is essential. Dissemination of this
information in a timely way to both funding agencies and the research
community.

A8): I cannot speak to this one.

A8): How about a space weather exhibit in the Smithsonian? Certainly
more space weather exhibits in museums. Dare I suggest a Hollywood
movie?

A8): NASA and NSF typically have EPO programs associated with their
projects. Do NOAA and Air Force have EPO programs? If not, then they
could expand the space weather outreach by supporting / encouraging EPO
activities.

A8): Same as 7

A8): Once the general problem has been sketched out, as I describe
above, I think there could be fruitful \"mini-challenges\", much as the
GEM community engages in, where subsets of the problem are addressed and
younger researchers challenged to compare their techniques. I continue
to look at the meteorology field for inspiration, and see where they are
continually discussing extreme events that models had difficulty with.
This approach I think would be meaningful, AFTER a global framework was
established.

A8): One method might be to form a study committee blessed by the
highest levels of NASA, NSF, NAS, NOAA and DoD to critically study the
problems in transitioning from research to operations. I suggest support
from a high level because the committee need to be able to critique
everything and not be told that there are sacred cows such as NPOESS
which cannot be criticized. The committee making this assessment may
feel that it has such a role to play. However, I wonder if anything this
committee will say will be taken seriously at the high levels of
government where real action has to start.

A8): Museum exhibits are an excellent way to reach a broader public and
additional efforts to augment what has been done already is recommended.
In addition, more outreach towards our Congress would be useful since
NSWP illustrates the importance of research and its benefits to society
in an exemplary manner.

A8): At the K-12 level, more emphasis on space weather impacts on
ordinary citizens might be done. We created a series of solar and space
weather activities for grades 5-12 (through NASA OSS EPO funding) and we
have used these to train teachers at 5 teacher workshops in New Jersey.
Efforts like this are important and could be made more widely available,
but that requires greater funding in the outreach arena.

A8): Course development for space weather at the college level.

**9) Any general comments on NSWP successes, shortfalls, and possible
future directions of the program?**

A9): Once again, most of the programs within NSWP are concerned with
value-added efforts. There is far too little attention given to basic
data collection.

A9): I don\'t know enough details to offer any suggestions other than
those above.

A9): NOT YET

A9): I hope the program continues \"forever\". Perhaps it needs a
mechanism by which major research/monitoring/modeling/forecasting
efforts get a NSWP \"Logo\" to add to their collection.

A9): Progress requires the development of global-scale kinetic models. A
global-scale 2-D hybrid code (Swift&Lin, JASTP, 63, 683-704, 2001) has
show the generation of auroral Alfven waves and provided the link
between events in the plasma sheet and the aurora. A full 3-D,
global-scale hybrid code is needed to understand space weather and to
provide a basis for space weather prediction. Such a project is likely
too large for a single investigator or university department. A major
national laboratory should be given the task. The continued piecemeal
structure of the modeling effort will continue to produce null results.

A9): This is one step for the future cooperation in my opinion.

A9): Success: NOAA/NASA/USAF cooperation on ACE. Possible future
direction that augers well: their cooperation on coronagraph and EUV
disk monitoring of the Sun on GOES-R\....also operational Sentinels if
cost can be contained. Shortfalls: too much money on geospace vehicles
that produce more data that is less useful for magnetosheric model
validations for forecasting\...enough is available for nowcasting. Get
off the solar sail kick (fine, perhaps, 50 years from now) to get
another hour\'s warning. A possible future direction might be to ask the
solar people: which observations would you want to be used operationally
as input to physically-based models? And the same question to modelers!
And, another question for both groups: would you be willing to put your
suggestions (data and models) to REAL-TIME tests to establish
contingency tables and metrics?\...and to publish them? \[I\'ve had one
prominent researcher say to me, regarding metrics, \"No way. That is
doomed for failure!\"\]

A9): The greatest successes of the NSWP are an increased amount of
readily available data on the internet, often in real time; the
development of coupled \"sun-to-mud\" space weather models; and the
beginning of assimilative data models patterned after the assimilative
models used in terrestrial weather forecasting (GAIM).

The greatest shortfall of the NSWP is the lack of a national-scale space
weather centers,

that combine both models and data feeds, patterned after the
tropospheric weather centers

such as NCEP.

Another significant shortfall of the NSWP is the imbalance between
investments in

space-borne sensors, and the investments in the models that use these
data to produce

effective space weather predictions.

The most promising future direction of the program is development of the
national space

weather center, that combines elements of operations, research, and data
centers, patterned after NCEP, ECMWF, etc.

One of the most promising sources of data, GPS receivers in orbiting
constellations, has no programmatic backing from NSWP. The
FORMOSAT-3/COSMIC constellation due to launch in 2006 has no
programmatic backing that will enable these data to be used for
effective space weather prediction. It\'s as if NCEP ignored weather
data acquired from space: it is inconceivable. Yet, in the space weather
arena, ignoring such data is a fact.

I can state it succinctly thus: if human life, or billions of dollars
depended on space

weather prediction, we would have adopted a different approach than has
been adopted thus far. The program today is a very modest change to the
research program that existed before NSWP. In other words, the NSWP is
not an effective program for improving space weather prediction.

A9): The predictive aspect of NSWP seems to be lagging. Are we able to
do substorm

prediction better than before? Do the models self-validate against
measurements the way that tropospheric weather models do?

A9): I am concerned about not involving other agencies, such as the FAA,
in the assessment. **(Please keep this answer confidential).**

A9): While it's relatively straightforward to list all the
accomplishments achieved since

the start of the program in 1994, it's extremely difficult to establish
the extent to which,

or how, or whether, these accomplishments were the direct result of the
program. One

indisputable fact is that the proliferation of the term "space weather"
began about the same time the program was being established, and that
correlation cannot be coincidental. In the paragraphs below, I speculate
about how different space weather activities were initiated, and to what
extent the NSWP contributed. Then I offer some recommendations based on
these considerations.

The CCMC has always been cited as an NSWP success story. However, the
CCMC is the result of a partnership between Air Force Space Command and
NASA that was begun in 1997 seemingly independent of any action on the
part of the NSWP. The partnership was formalized in an MOA between AFSC
and NASA signed by Dan Goldin and Gen. Howell M. Estis III. The MOA is
dated Feb. 28, 1997. One of the study teams named in the MOA was titled
"Expanded Cooperation on Space Environment". A "Terms of Reference" for
this study team attached to the memo has a background section that
begins with a description of the NSWP including a reference to the
strategic plan. So it certainly seems as though the NSWP was considered
in defining this part of the partnership. There was a meeting at Goddard
in June 1997 to discuss this expanded cooperation between Space Command
and NASA, and representatives from NOAA, NSF, and other agencies
attended. One of the working groups formed at that meeting was to
address space weather models. Kevin Scro and Terry Onsager led this
working group, which

later proposed the establishment of a "community coordinated modeling
center". We'll

probably never know whether the NSWP inspired the original partnership
between Space Command and NASA, but certainly the Program played a role
in the Terms of Reference that eventually led to establishing the CCMC,
and in coordinating inter-agency support for the Center after it got
going.

The National Security Space Architect study on space weather is another
example of an

activity that is hard to trace back to the NSWP. The Terms of Reference
that contains the

charge for the Space Weather Architecture Study was approved by the DoD
Space Architect, Maj. Gen. Robert Dickman, in December 1997. The Study
was briefed to the CSW in the same month. Obviously, the Study had been
advocated by forces within the DoD for a long time prior to its
presentation to the NSWP. The TOR explicitly mentions the NSWP Strategic
Plan and uses a definition of space weather that is an exact quote from
that document. The Space Architect Study led to a transition plan, and
by that time the NSWP was sufficiently tied into the process that the
Committee for Space Weather was selected as the body to oversee this
transition. Though the transition plan was never implemented for a
variety of reasons, the Space Architect Study helped to raise the
awareness of space weather within the DoD, and there is no doubt that
the NSWP helped motivate the study in the first place.

Of course, the prime example of the inability to trace origins back to
the NSWP is NASA's Living With a Star program. The concept for LWS was
developed in the summer of 1999 and presented to Dan Goldin in August of
that year. From the Fall of 1999 to Spring 2000, Goddard developed a
preliminary implementation plan for the program, and by summer of 2000 a
program office was established at Goddard. Although the program was
first mentioned to the NSWP CSW in July 1999, a description of the
program was not presented to the committee until one year later. The LWS
program was developed with no coordination with the NSWP, but was
described as "responsive and congruent to the NSWP".

Another program with somewhat cloudy origins is the University
Partnership for Operational Support (UPOS) involving Johns Hopkins
University Applied Physics Lab and the Geophysical Institute of the
University of Alaska Fairbanks. UPOS was first briefed to the Committee
for Space Weather in April 1999, but it had already been underway for a
couple of years. UPOS research has been carried out independently of the
NSWP, but the extent to which the NSWP was used to justify the program
is difficult to determine.

My purpose in recounting this history is to counter claims that the NSWP
"has no teeth".

Just because the program has not directly resulted in millions of new
research dollars

invested in our community, many have underestimated the impact of the
program. I find it frustrating that there are those in our community who
do not take the program seriously

because it has been around for ten years, but still has no budget
attached to it. I am

aware of several large NASA programs that took way more than 10 years
before any money materialized, and with far less to show in terms of
indirect benefits along the way.

Another reason to dwell on these historic events is to help pin down
what the NSWP has done to enable these success stories, so that we can
continue to help in similar ways. In other words, I'm looking for the
common thread in these successes that have helped them happen. I think
the answer is simple. It's the awareness of and appreciation for space
weather as a distinct discipline that has underpinned all of the
NSWP-inspired activities. The development of the strategic and
implementation plans, the many workshops and special meeting sessions,
the focused proposal competitions through NSF program solicitations,
CISM, the MURI modeling centers, the CCMC, the new journal Space
Weather---each of these has contributed to making space weather almost a
household word.

Based on these considerations, I offer several recommendations:

1\) Sponsor more workshops. The series of workshops that were held in
the 90s focusing on space weather impacts were extremely informative and
helped get the research community talking to existing and potential
space weather customers. Space Weather Week has expanded to continue
these efforts, but it's not enough. Focused workshops provide a better
venue for detailed discussions. Also, I think it would be informative to
repeat some of the previous workshop themes to see what has changed in
the past 10 years.

2\) Update program plans. The NSWP Strategic Plan and Implementation
Plans are somewhat out of date. We need an updated or revised plan to
better coordinate among agencies and across space weather activities
that may overlap or complement each other. Plans for LWS and NPOESS have
changed significantly and these changes should be reflected in NSWP
long-range plans. The excellent progress that has been made in modeling
should also be taken into consideration in the new plan, as well as what
we have learned about transitioning models to operations. Furthermore,
budget constraints are causing delays in space missions and inhibiting
the development of new ground-based instrumentation. A thoughtful plan
is needed to ensure that the ground-based and space-based efforts are
coordinated in such a way as to fill the impending gaps in observations
and in keeping the scientific communities engaged in the interim. Roles
for industry and the international community should also be included in
the revised program plan.

3\) Improve communication. Communication among agencies and from the
agencies to space weather stakeholders has proven to be essential in
helping initiate and execute space weather activities. Development of an
NSWP web site has languished for a long time, but recent progress has
been made. A web site will make it more apparent to the community what
the program is doing and also provide a means for feedback to NSWP
planners. Communication among agencies can be improved through more
meetings. As abhorrent as this sounds, meetings can be very effective in
aiding the flow of information. However, these meetings must include
agency representatives at a lower level than the existing CSW members.
The frequency of CSW meetings has been limited because of the busy
schedule of the chairs. More space weather activities should be
coordinated through smaller, focused subcommittees, referred to as Joint
Action Groups by OFCM. The CSW should make use of JAGs to ensure that
program activities continue in between full CSW meetings.

4\) Emphasize the systems approach. Interdisciplinary research has
tremendous staying power in today's world. The NSWP's interdisciplinary
aspects not only relate to studying the space environment as a coupled
system from Sun to mud, but also to its goal of transitioning results
from research to operations, and to education and public outreach.

Although there are many large programs with space weather relevance, the
NSWP is the only overarching program with broad responsibilities
encompassing science, engineering, and education.

5\) Avoid exaggerating space weather impacts. Although the program began
with claims of impending disasters that might occur from space weather,
no one really believed this was a good way to argue the merits of the
program. Just considering the examples given above, one sees that the
successful programs were sold on the basis of intellectual merit---the
importance of simply understanding the space environment to the point
where prediction is accurate. NSWP is a mature program now, and it is
time to move away from exaggerated claims. Space weather is
intellectually challenging and has great public appeal. The importance
of the program is obvious as civilization becomes more dependent on
space-based systems and sensitive technology, not to mention the
resurrection of space exploration. No one will argue with the importance
of what the military refers to as space situational awareness. This
should be the primary driver for the NSWP. There may be dramatic space
weather events in the future, but we should not lead the public to
expect catastrophic impacts. In fact, if there are catastrophic results,
we will find it difficult to argue the success of space weather research
over the last ten years.

Other than these, the only other suggestion I have is to make sure the
program is being

evaluated by the right criteria. Impact takes many more forms than just
the amount of

dollars produced, and history has shown that it's much easier to argue
for increased funding once a discipline or program has gained wide
acceptance.

Note to Panel: My memory of events relating to the NSWP during the last
ten years was aided by looking back through the minutes of the CSW
meetings. I hope OFCM has provided you with these minutes, which
probably date back to 1997 or earlier. It would be nice if these minutes
were put on the NSWP web site.

A9): When I read the initial NSWP documentation I felt that it had been
assembled by people who had vested interests in the program. While this
is not necessarily \"bad\" if it truly reflects the entire community, I
felt that the program was heavily biased toward MHD development (in all
areas), while ignoring statistical studies and/or empirical models. I
should state that I have not applied for any grant under the NSF NSWP.

A9): In summary, the NSWP is an excellent example of interagency and
scientific community coordination. Overall, the NSWP has advanced the
space weather field in the sciences, services (less so), and public
awareness. However, more attention should be paid to the end users and
impacts (cost-benefit analysis, collection/database, economic and policy
research, etc.).

A9): The transition from rather compartmentalized research to integrated
system investigations has been astounding.

A9): NSWP has been very successful in many areas. However, ties should
be strengthened with the large national programs related to civil
GPS-based navigation emanating from the Department of Transportation:
WAAS, LAAS, CORS, etc.

A9): DIFFICULT TO SAY, BECAUSE SO LITTLE IS KNOWN ABOUT WHAT HAS BEEN
ACCOMPLISHED, IF ANYTHING.

A9): The \"traditional science approach\" that dominates now, i.e.,
construct models and discuss how well some chosen time series can be
matched well, will not go far. Need to develop more objective ways to
judge models/techniques. Give funding agency managers more
responsibility to demand and choose programs with demonstrated
user-relevant promise. The traditional approach of relying almost
entirely on peer-review panel tends to favor the status quo (i.e., the
traditional approach) and has not been effective. The managers, of
course, are to be held accountable for their choices based on the
demonstrable results. If a technique or program should prove very
promising, the managers should be given the ability to transition the
technique to operations.

A9): Need to focus on the Sun for long term prediction (helioseismology,
magnetic transport, cycle characteristics, coronal dynamics and flare
research). Geospace needs to get its act together and stop studying
details and start looking at the interfaces between the charged
atmosphere and the neutral atmosphere (energetics, dynamics,
composition).

The atmospheric scientists need to start collaborations with us.

A9): Kinetic models have to be implemented as supplementary to MHD
models.

A9): Need to make it clearer in the larger community what NSWP is doing
and planning-

and how it has had and continues to have major influence on the space
weather enterprise. Perhaps more regular surveys of this kind- say every
5 years- would keep useful feedback flowing into the executive decision
making process

A9): NSWP program is an example of success in this area.

A9): The funding sources for space reasearch from the Air Force, NASA
and Navy have shrunk dramatically in the last couple of years. NSF is
now overwhelmed with proposals to support the science community. NSWP
should encourage continued broad agency funding.

A9): I cannot overemphasize the negative impact of lack of reliable
real-time data from most of the world on commercial space weather
activities. This is the #1 problem that is not being addressed, or is
inadequately addressed, by the NSWP to date. Problem #2 is the lack of
demonstrated improvements with clear, and independent, assessments of
the quantitative accuracy and shortfalls of these improvements, in
ionospheric specification and short-term forecasting, much of which
suffers greatly from lack of data (see problem #1).

A9): We need to make the beginnings of a transition to operations in
Geospace, with dedicated, permanent upstream monitoring.

A9): Allow the most appropriate institutions to fully participate in it!

A9): Must of the NSWP research efforts result from work that researchers
were doing anyway but now have better source of funding for. The NASA
LWS program is one exception. The near term LWS program (SDO, RBSP,
ITSP, Sentinals) will provide new data with NSWP focus that have not
been available in such a targeted way previously. These new data will
provide a level of space weather characterization that has not been
previously possible. The NSWP should focus on supporting the LWS and
ILWS programs and using those data resources in their future efforts.

A9): space weather research is very important, and will become more so
as the nation becomes more-heavily involved in the uses of space.
Continued support is needed.

Identification of areas in which basic research can make real and
necessary contributions should be a high-priority task.

A9): The connection between various kinds of academic research and
\"Space Weather\" has been stretched thin. The delineation between Space
Weather research and Space Science research ought to be maintained
better when funding is dispersed. This seems to be only way to influence
space scientists to do work that might actually advance the NSWP goals
(as opposed to their own personal interests.)

A9): Progress in the last 10 years has been spectacular. Let us not lose
momentum.

A9): I am excited about the potential for NSWP to enable future manned
missions to Moon or Mars. I think protecting astronauts will be highly
beneficial to space exploration. If commercial and defense space efforts
benefit as well, that should be an easier problem.

A9): It seems that the NSWP stands at a crossroads between a glorious
future and total collapse. To stand around and do nothing will insure a
drift toward total collapse.

A9): I have made several general comments above. The NSWP needs a wider
and deeper funding profile, across more agencies, and NASA needs to
understand its importance to a greater extent. More
instrumental/observational assets are needed, for which the NSWP is far
too small to directly support, but it could play the role of
coordinator. The over-emphasis on simplistic models is a problem.

**10) Please include any special instructions you may have for the
disposition of your**

**submitted comments (i.e. are your comments confidential, etc.)**

A10): I would appreciate speaking personally to the review board.

A10): No restriction. I hope that the assessment committee will call on
some practicing

solar physicists to get the solar perspective (apologies to Lou and
Pete).

A10): Of course.

A10): You are free to use any of these comments in your report although
I want to approve any remarks that might be attributed directly to me. I
would also like to receive a copy of what I have submitted.

A10): IF I WRITE MY NAME, THE \"USUAL SUSPECTS\" WILL SEE TO IT THAT I
NEVER WILL GET A GRANT EVER AGAIN. IT WOULD SEEM THAT YOU ARE SOME OF
THE USUAL SUSPECTS\.....

A10): I would be happy to discuss this matter in greater detail.

A10): My comments are for the assessment committee only and are thus
candid and reflect only my personal perspective on NSWP.

A10): my comments are not confidential

A10): Most of what I have said can be attributed. The part I have
reservation being attributed are those regarding UCLA. I would prefer
that that example be excised in any attributed version of my responses.

A10): Feel free to contact me for additional information. I\'m very
interested and involved in space weather research (e.g., NASA TIMED,
NASA SDO, NOAA GOES) and am committed to taking the research results to
the next level needed for space weather operations.

A10): Comments are not confidential, but for reasons of conflict of
interest, I would rather not give my name.

A10): These comments are my personal observations and are not official
comments. Technically, I should have prepared by responses for review by
my management but I didn't. If I had, I think that would have defeated
the purpose of this survey.

A10): My comments are addressed as input to the review committee. They
can shared without attribution to funding agencies.