SAN FRANCISCO — Commercial satellites, ground-based monitoring stations and airborne sensors can help the U.S. National Weather Service produce more timely and accurate forecasts. But those tools cannot offer the kind of advance notice of severe weather that the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) obtains from polar-orbiting satellites, witnesses said March 28 during a hearing of the House Science energy and environment subcommittee.

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Debra Werner is a correspondent for SpaceNews based in San Francisco. Debra earned a bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of California, Berkeley, and a master’s degree in Journalism from Northwestern University. She is a recipient...