Do you really know enough about the weather to cruise beyond the horizon. Do you recognize the clues that are telling you, “Seek shelter now!” TrawlerFest presents two back-to-back seminars by a real expert designed to sharpen your weather eye.

In “Survive: Marine Weather in Theory,” Lee Chesneau, veteran mariner and former forecaster for the U.S. Navy and National Weather Service, explains basic weather terminology and 101 concepts such as temperature, wind and pressure and cloud identification. This course is intended as an introduction to Chesneau’s “Thrive! Marine Weather in Practice,” which teaches attendees how to read a surface weather map. 

Both courses are Saturday, Sept. 27 at the Baltimore Marine Centers at Harborview. “Survive” begins at 8:30 a.m. and “Thrive” at 10:45.

 Chesneau retired from government service with over 24 years between the U.S. Navy and NOAA. After successful tours onboard the USS Saratoga and the USS Guam during Vietnam, he was stationed at the Navy Weather Centers in Rota, Spain, and Norfolk, Virginia. Although Chesneau left active duty in 1979, he remained in the Naval Reserves and joined NOAA in 1979 after working briefly as a ship router for OceanRoutes Inc.

He began his NOAA career in the satellite service, where he provided guidance on developing storms over the North Pacific in areas where there were no buoys and precious few ship observations. His next assignment was with the National Weather Service as a member of the Seattle Ocean Services Unit in 1983. He then joined the Ocean Prediction Center (formerly the Marine Prediction Center) in 1989, where he remained until retirement.

During his time with the OPC, many mariners have gotten to know Chesneau from his marine weather training and Heavy Weather Avoidance classes, taught in conjunction with the Maritime Institute of Technology and Graduate Studies, and from his well received talks at numerous boat shows. Lee is only one of a few people across the nation who has been certified as an USCG Standard Training, Certification, and Watch Standing (STCW) Instructor for basic and advanced meteorology.

The VOS program, especially the Mariners Weather Log, holds Chesneau in high regard. He also has authored or co-authored numerous MWL classics, such as “Hurricane Avoidance Using the 34 Knot Wind Radius and 1-2-3 Rules (1999)” and the heralded “Mariner‘s Guide to the 500-Mb Chart (1995).”