HARVEST: establisH A foRecast VErification dataSet Through citizen reports

Active

from 08/12/2019

Since August 2019, users of the smartphone app of the Royal Meteorological Institute of Belgium (RMI) are able to send an observation of the meteorological conditions at a certain place and a certain time. The observations provide information about the weather conditions and potentially severe weather to the other users and to RMI. The collection of citizen weather reports is a valuable complement to the information obtained with the classical instruments like stations, radar and satellite.

Users can report one the following weather phenomena (with several subtypes):

  1. Sun & clouds
  2. Overcast
  3. Rain
  4. Thunderstorm
  5. Hail
  6. Snow
  7. Severe wind
  8. Whirlwind
  9. Fog
  10. Snow cover
  11. Road condition
  12. Flood
  13. Optical phenomenon

Each observation is subject to a sanity or plausibility check. The sanity check consists of a real-time comparison with a relevant field of RMI's nowcasting system. The thresholding limits used to attach a quality-label to an observation were set in consultation with the RMI forecasters.

Users are also able to attach a picture to their observation.

Aim

 The data can be exploited for nowcasting, warnings and model verification, and eventually in data assimilation.

Participation & Audience

Target group: All citizens

Number of participants: 100000+

How to participate

Download the RMI app and send in your first observation!


Impact
Community impact: Citizen reports flow to governmental authorities responsible for public safety (flood, road conditions, etc...). Citizen are indirectly involved in decision-making. More weather-awareness of general public.
Community impact types: Sustainable practices, Other
Insights and Highlights
Achievements:
- Vast collection of citizen reports over the years - Intensive use in operational weather and flood monitoring and forecasting - Integrated in dashboards of hydrological authorities - Exploited in research such as hail detection by radar - Development and/or validation of newly developed products, e.g., hydrometeor classification
Challenges:
- Fake observations and trolling. - Users being not precise enough on their observation.
Outreach methods:
RMI public website (news items), social media.
Interesting highlights:
Launched in 2019 and still active. Solid user base is established ensuring continuous growing database.
Coordinator
Royal Meteorological Institut…
Governmental
HARVEST: establisH A foRecast VErification dataSet Through citizen reports Go to Project Access Dataset
Water type
Surface water Snow & ice
Keywords
Floods Precipitation
Science Topics
Water Climate
Tags
Suitable for children Participate from home
Difficulty Level
Easy
Participation tasks
Data Entry Measurement Observation Photography
Location
National
Contact
E-mail
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Created Dec. 12, 2025, 2:04 p.m.
Updated Dec. 12, 2025, 2:36 p.m.

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