Iad controller voiced frustration regarding the lack of contact with local contract weather personne...

Narrative:

The weather was getting very bad at the airport. Aircraft were reporting that the visibility was much worse than the automated weather system was saying. Also; aircraft were reporting moderate icing on final approach. We are required to augment the automated weather to reflect the most current weather. To do this; we have to call the contract weather service here at iad on the phone and advise them to augment the weather reporting system. The supervisor called on the phone for 20 minutes and could not get them. The supervisor was forced to call security and have them go down to the contractors office to see if anyone was still there. The security people did find the contractor and get them to finally call the tower after about an hour. This is a very serious safety concern. Aircraft were encountering icing and bad weather prior to us being able to advise them about it. The company providing the contract weather service at iad are in violation of the requirements of there contract.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: IAD controller voiced frustration regarding the lack of contact with local contract weather personnel during a period of rapidly changing weather conditions; reporter indicating the situation was a serious safety concern.

Narrative: The weather was getting very bad at the airport. Aircraft were reporting that the visibility was much worse than the automated weather system was saying. Also; aircraft were reporting moderate icing on final approach. We are required to augment the automated weather to reflect the most current weather. To do this; we have to call the contract weather service here at IAD on the phone and advise them to augment the weather reporting system. The Supervisor called on the phone for 20 minutes and could not get them. The Supervisor was forced to call security and have them go down to the contractors office to see if anyone was still there. The security people did find the contractor and get them to finally call the tower after about an hour. This is a very serious safety concern. Aircraft were encountering icing and bad weather prior to us being able to advise them about it. The company providing the contract weather service at IAD are in violation of the requirements of there contract.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.

Attributes
ACN	870207
Time
Date	200910
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	IAD.Tower
State Reference	DC
Environment
Flight Conditions	IMC
Light	Night
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Any Unknown or Unlisted Aircraft Manufacturer
Flight Phase	Final Approach
Person 1
Function	Ground
Qualification	Air Traffic Control Fully Certified
Experience	Air Traffic Control Military 5 Air Traffic Control Non Radar 5 Air Traffic Control Radar 5
Events
Anomaly	Deviation - Procedural Other / Unknown

Iad controller voiced frustration regarding the lack of contact with local contract weather personnel during a period of rapidly changing weather conditions; reporter indicating the situation was a serious safety concern.