NTSB Special Report

Errors such as providing an icing modifier for a turbulence report (“TB MOD RIME” for turbulence moderate rime), coding an urgent PIREP as a routine report, including extra spaces or symbols in a location text element, or other typographical errors (“KGT” instead of “LGT” for “light,” or “MDT” instead of “MOD” for “moderate”) can severely reduce a PIREP’s usefulness.
For example, a CWSU meteorologist pointed out that the AWC website, which displays graphical depictions of PIREP information, cannot process PIREPs that contain typographical or formatting errors. Thus, PIREPs containing such errors may not be disseminated to the NAS. The meteorologist also stated that some urgent PIREPs—including one that reported a funnel cloud—that appeared in a text-based system were not displayed on the AWC website due to formatting issues.