National Weather Museum Could Be On Horizon

A National weather museum and science center to help establish Oklahoma as the “weather capital of the world” is in the planning stages.

A preliminary concept for the museum, approved last week by the Norman Chamber of Commerce Weather Committee, will be reviewed by the Norman and OU officials over the next few weeks. The museum, estimated to cost about $50 million, would preserve the history of weather reseach and forecasting, and provide an environment or education and technology, the planning documents states.

The “ National Weather Center” taking shape on the south campus of the University of Oklahoma is a concept the rest of the country may come to recognize as fact, Weather Committee members maintain.

The “weather community” of government agencies and private weather companies based in Norman has gained national attention, stemming from research to effectively predict and track severe storms. Planners say a weather museum would capitalize on that and could attract about 100,00 visitors a year.

Kelvin Droegemeier, director of the Center for the Analysis and Prediction of Storms (CAPS), also heads the Weather Committee. He said the committee’s outline for a national weather museum is “a broad vision of what this thing will breathe life into it.”

The preliminary plan specifies the museum would have about 160,000 square feet. It could contain exhibit space, collection space for archives not on display, storage and preparations areas, administrative offices, a gift shop, café, 500-seat conference area, classrooms, a “discovery room,” an amateur radio station, a broadcast production studio, a library and an “IMAX-like theater.”

The Weather Committee suggests funds to build the museum could come from federal grants, city and state support and private donations.

“No major museum or science center dedicated to weather and climate exists anywhere in the world today,” the planners maintain. The weather museum “is expected to be the world’s largest and most comprehensive environment for preserving the breadth and depth of weather and climate science, technology and application…”

As now envisioned, the museum could exhibit historical artifacts such as the first Doppler weather radar console; telegraphs; portable tornado detection devices; rare weather records; hands-on displays and experiments; simulators; experimental devices such as a tornado vortex generator; a wind tunnel and a cloud chamber; a working radar and display of researchers aircraft.

At a monthly meeting Tuesday, the Weather Committee approved sending the museum plan to OU President David Boren and the Norman Chamber Board of Directors. The museum could complement OU’s Fred Jones Museum of Art and Sam Noble Museum of Natural History, Droegemeier said.