The origins of meteorological services
within HDR are quite literally found from coast-coast across the United States.
From the coast lines of New Hampshire, the lakes of Wisconsin, the rolling
plains and farmlands of Nebraska to the coastal areas and wine country of
California came the meteorologists of HDR bringing with them their dreams and
love of weather.
Meteorological consulting services came
to HDR in November 2000 with the acquisition of Henz Meteorological Services
(HMS), a private weather consulting business in Denver, Colorado. HMS was
well-known for its hydro-meteorological services throughout the western
two-thirds of the country. These services included:
Two HMS meteorologists joined HDR: John Henz, the owner of HMS, and Bryan Rappolt, an 8-yr HMS employee joined HDR in November and October 2000 creating the new HDR Hydro-Meteorological Services. John grew up in Wisconsin along the stormy shores of Lake Michigan while Bryan learned to weather the fabled waves of Nor-Easters along the rugged New Hampshire coast. John and Bryan developed the early framework for the meteorologist-engineer connection that defines the services provided.
From 2001 to early 2005 John and Bryan worked on a number of award-winning and successful projects that included a 2003 ACEC award winning Holcim Wind prediction project that provided 24-7 forecast support for the building of a 300 ft cement pre-heater tower in the mountains of Colorado. They followed this project with live-saving flood response plans in Arizona, Nevada and Colorado. Noteworthy among these was the Truckee River Flood Response Plan developed for Washoe County, Reno and Sparks Nevada. This plan was tested by a 100-yr plus flood in January 2006 that saved lives, kept the Reno airport open and reduced flood damages suffered by an order of magnitude. While Bryan left HDR in early 2005 to start his own weather service, HDR’s meteorologists grew in numbers and acclaim.
In Spring 2002 Rob Rahrs joined HDR
after working for a federal lab in Boulder, Colorado and briefly for another
private weather service in Erie, Colorado. Rob grew up as a weather-savvy youth
on the storm-plagued plains of south-central Nebraska. He provided key support
early on to Bryan and John in the flash flood prediction program for the Denver
metro area. Rob’s natural data organizational skills and interest in creative
data presentation evolved from creating maps, spreadsheets and HailTraks for
insurance companies which was come to be known as the “Hail Damage Bible” which
was used by four national insurance companies as the last word in hail damage
for a multi-million dollar forensic case in Houston, Texas. This multi-data
relational database blended weather observations, radar observations, damage
observations and claims, aerial photography and GIS analyses into a coherent
picture of hail damage that impacted a large school district.
This project served as a catalyst for Rob to pursue and achieve a Master of Engineering –GIS in late 2007. While working on his Masters degree, Rob merged creative insights with John Henz and another new HDR meteorologist, Bill Badini, to create an innovative Extreme Precipitation Analysis Tool (EPAT) that has evolved into a Colorado state standard for developing Probable Maximum Precipitation (PMP) rainfall fields for rehabilitation and sizing of high country dams. Interest in EPAT as a new extreme precipitation analysis standard has spread into New Mexico with strong interest brewing in Wyoming and Arizona.
Bill Badini brought a surge of energy into HDR when he joined the hydro-met group in mid-2002. Bill grew up in Wisconsin and served as an intern junior meteorologist in the HMS Denver metro flash flood prediction program during the summers of 1996 and 1997 while working on his Master in Atmospheric Science at the University of Wisconsin. Bill briefly joined HMS as a meteorologist before working as a meteorologist at an energy-based firm in the Mid-West. Once he joined HDR Bill quickly became involved in the development and defining process of a new design storm concept – the scientifically defensible design storm (SDDS) - the 2004 ACEC award winning South Boulder Creek floodplain delineation project. The SDDS relied on WSR-88D Doppler radar data to refine the spatial and temporal characteristics of the design storm. The synergistic conceptualization of the SDDS by Bill and John was realized in the GIS-based presentation of the data by Rob.
Bill and John have had notable success at developing original and innovative water supply forecasting processes based on the use of hydro-climate indices (HCI). Their initial collaboration on this process was realized during the Flathead Drought Management Plan where they were part of a successful team effort that merged HDR hydro-modeling from Seattle, water supply management and EIS from Minneapolis, statistical analyses from Toronto and the HCI-skills from Denver into a viable plan that accurately anticipates floods and drought conditions in the Flathead River basin of Montana and adjusts the water supply forecast and flow to meet rule curves designed to meet in-stream minimum flow, hydro-electric generation and recreational lake level needs. Bill’s Flathead Precipitation Runoff Index (FPRI) won him an internal HDR Creativity Award.
In August 2007 Mike McMahon joined the
HDR team fresh from 20 years as an aviation meteorologist for an international
aviation weather firm. Mike grew up with a healthy respect for the Pacific
Ocean’s influence on local precipitation, flooding events and water supply. As
“Meteorologist Mike” on local San Francisco radio stations he quickly gained a
reputation for being able to make highly accurate forecasts of sunny and wet
weather while his weather forecasting peers were left in fog created by Mo
Nature. Mike’s 20-years of aviation weather support will be used to develop the
foundations of a strong operational weather center at HDR in the months ahead.
Mike’s presence was immediately felt by John as his “can do” California philosophy refreshed the group. His keen operational and managerial insights sharpened the Hydro-Met group’s vision and paved the way to a pivotal meeting in Omaha in August 2007. At this meeting the Hydro-Met group changed its name to the HDR Atmospheric Science Group (ASG) to reflect the expanding range of services provided by the group that have developed in the wake and broadening interest created by climate variability issues across the country. Additionally, the ASG strengthened ties with the Minneapolis-based HDR Air Quality Group led by Ed Liebsch and Scott Zilka.
Look for the increasing synergy of these talented meteorologists to lead HDR into a successful future of providing client support in the atmospheric science consulting arena.