Chris Broyles


John C. "Chris" Broyles is an American meteorologist who is a weather forecaster and tornado forecasting expert with the Storm Prediction Center.

Education

Broyles attended St. Edward's University in Texas, before transferring to the University of Northern Colorado, where he graduated with bachelor's degrees in meteorology and journalism.

Career

In 1994, Broyles was hired as an intern at the National Weather Service office in Jackson, Kentucky. Following his internship, Broyles was hired as a forecaster at the NWS office in Aberdeen, South Dakota. In 2003, Broyles was hired at the Storm Prediction Center at the National Weather Center in Norman, Oklahoma as a forecaster. Throughout his career forecasting at the SPC, Broyles issued 14 High Risk Outlooks, with 11 verifications. On April 7, 2006, Broyles issued the first-ever Day-2 High Risk Outlook, in preparation for the tornado outbreak of April 6–8, 2006. This High Risk also included a 60% chance of tornadoes, including at least some becoming significant. Following verification of this High Risk, the United States Department of Commerce awarded Broyles with a Silver Medal. On April 14, 2012, Broyles issued the second-ever Day-2 High Risk Outlook, while forecasting for the tornado outbreak of April 13–16, 2012.

Publications

Throughout his career, Broyles has authored and co-authored several academic papers and case studies. Besides academic publications, Broyles led a team of twenty others to create the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Violent Tornado webpage, which documented more than 200 tornado outbreaks throughout the United States' history.