The National Weather Service is looking for a few good words to
describe winter's worst conditions. "Over the past few years,
we've gotten a lot of feedback that our current advisory service
is confusing," said Louise Fode, the agency's public program
manager for the Alaska region. Currently, alerts are issued to
the public as "advisories," "warnings" and "watches." A warning
describes especially dangerous conditions that are occurring or
imminent, said Aimee Fish, acting weather coordination
meteorologist with the NWS in Anchorage. An advisory is for
conditions less hazardous than those described in a warning. A
watch means there is the potential for bad weather that may not
occur at all. Within three main categories are 14 more specific
"winter weather products," including "freezing rain advisory,"
"ice storm warning" and "blizzard watch." One of the 14
subcategories, "Extreme Cold Warning," is used only in Alaska
when forecasts call for at least three consecutive days of air
temperature colder than 40 belo