Weather for your projects (alerts and tomorrow's forecast)

With Weather on for a project, LaunchPad Safety watches the National Weather Service (NWS) for the project's location. The project's Superintendents and Safety get emails, and everyone with LaunchPad Safety on the project sees the alerts and tomorrow's forecast on the phone app's Home screen. These are supplemental notices: your site's emergency action plan stays in charge.

Before you start

• The project has its address in Procore (Project Admin > Project Information). The forecast is for that location.
• Administrators, Safety Personnel and Project Administrators turn Weather on or off. Everyone else sees it.
• Site sign-in isn't needed. A trade's foreman working on a general contractor's site gets Weather for his own company's project in the app.

Turn it on

Weather is one switch per project. Change it in any of these places; they all show the same setting. 1. Settings > Weather. Tick Apply to all projects to turn it on for every project, including ones added later. Or tick projects one by one in the list. 2. Site sign-in. Choose the project; the Weather card has the switch for that project. 3. Create Site Orientation. Setting up site sign-in for a project turns Weather on for it. The switch is under the project if you want it off.

With Apply to all projects on, you can still untick a project in the list: it stays off as an exception. Ticking or unticking Apply to all projects again sets every project the same way.

What people get

• Emails to the project's Superintendents and Safety:
  • Weather alert when an NWS alert starts: the headline, severity, when it's in effect (project time), what NWS says to do, the details, and the site's muster point and emergency contacts when the project has site sign-in.
  • Updated weather alert only when NWS changes the type or severity (for example a Severe Thunderstorm Warning becomes a Tornado Warning). Small NWS updates don't send another email.
  • Ended or Cancelled when NWS no longer lists the alert or cancels it.
  • Tomorrow's weather at 2 PM (project time), every day except Saturday: conditions, temperature, heat index or wind chill, wind and gusts, rain chance, hour by hour from 6 AM to the end of the work day.
• The phone app, for everyone on the project: the Weather panel on Home shows alerts in effect (tap one for what NWS says to do) and a line for tomorrow. While the app is open it checks every 10 minutes and shows a phone notification for a new alert. Spanish speakers see it in Spanish; NWS's own instructions are in English.

Good to know

• When alert emails go out: Severe and Extreme alerts at any hour. Minor and Moderate alerts wait for the working day (6 AM to the site's end of the work day) and go out then if still in effect.
• Who gets the emails: the project's Superintendents and safety roles in Procore, and your Safety users in LaunchPad Safety. Someone taken off the project's weekly brief list doesn't get them.
• In the app it's always on for everyone on a project with Weather on; there's no setting to hide it.
• Alerts on phones, even with the app or page closed:
  • The phone app (Android): the app version with push notifications sends alerts to everyone signed in on a project with Weather on. Install it from the QR code on Get the app; allow notifications when asked.
  • The website, and the iPhone Home Screen app: on the Weather card, tap Get alerts on this device and allow notifications. On iPhone this works only in the Home Screen app (Safari: Share > Add to Home Screen).
  • People who sign in at the gate: after checking in, they can tap Get weather and safety alerts on this phone and allow notifications. They get this site's alerts only while signed in there. On iPhone this needs the Home Screen too.
  • Texts to people who ticked "Text me weather and safety alerts" at the gate start once our texting provider approves it.
• Heat index and wind chill are worked out from the NWS temperature, humidity and wind, the same way NWS does.
• Air quality comes from the U.S. EPA's AirNow (the nearest monitors, within 25 miles): the air quality index now and tomorrow's forecast category (Good, Moderate, Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups…), in the app, on the Weather card and in tomorrow's forecast email. AirNow data are preliminary. Official NWS Air Quality Alerts arrive as alerts.
• Air quality notices: when the air quality index near the project reaches 101 (Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups) a notice goes out (email to Superintendents and Safety, the app, the gate screen), with EPA's guidance. At 151 (Unhealthy) an update follows; at that level California's workplace wildfire smoke rule requires employers to act when the pollutant is PM2.5. Another update follows if it drops back to 101–150, and a note when it's back below 101. Below 101 it's reported only. Checked during the working day; AirNow updates hourly.
• LaunchPad Safety doesn't set limits. Stop or change work by your company's rules, the site safety plan and the equipment manufacturers' limits (cranes, aerial lifts, scaffolds).
• At the gate: anyone who scans the QR code while an alert is in effect sees it at the top of the sign-in screen, in their language, with the muster point. People already on site aren't reached that way: warn crews through your emergency action plan, and use Roll Call to see who is on site.
• Texts to people signed in at the gate come later. The sign-in screen already has an unticked box, "Text me weather and safety alerts for this site", so people can opt in now; nothing is texted until our texting provider approves it. A foreman can't tick it for a crew member, and replying STOP turns it off.
• Lightning: during the working day LaunchPad Safety checks for lightning strikes near the project every 5 minutes. A strike within 1 mile sends a Lightning within 1 mile notice (email to Superintendents and Safety, the app's Home screen, the gate sign-in screen). All clear goes out 30 minutes after the last strike within 1 mile, following the National Weather Service's lightning safety rule. As a storm approaches, the app and the Weather card show the nearest lightning within 10 miles ("Nearest lightning: 4.2 mi WNW, 3 min ago"). Strike data comes from the Xweather lightning network; a check every 5 minutes means a notice can follow a strike by a few minutes, so if you hear thunder, act on it.
• The Weather card on Site sign-in has Preview tomorrow's forecast (nothing is sent) and the last 30 days of alerts, with when each email went out and to how many people.

If something goes wrong

• "This project has no location in Procore": add the project's address in Procore, then reload.
• "Procore didn't answer just now" under who gets the emails: reload in a minute. Alerts still go out.
• "The National Weather Service didn't answer": weather.gov was busy; try again in a few minutes.
• No notification on the phone: allow notifications for LaunchPad Safety in the phone's settings. The Home screen shows the alert either way.