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Forecasts come from the National Weather Service's own computer models, and current conditions from the nearest reporting weather station. Both are served through the weather API. A forecast is guidance, not a warning, and anything the Weather Service has actually issued is on the live map.
Mason City sits at 43.1486°N, 93.1998°W in Cerro Gordo County, Iowa. The forecast above is drawn for that point from the National Weather Service's own computer models: a seven-day outlook, and a finer-grained one covering the next eighteen hours where it reaches, and the radar and alert panels show what the Weather Service has out over the area right now.
Place data from the US Census Bureau. Coordinates are the Census internal point for Mason City, and the forecast is for that location, not for every address inside the city limits, and a large city can have real weather differences from one side to the other.
The nearest Doppler radar is KDMX (Des Moines, IA), 102 miles to the SSW. A WSR-88D's lowest routine scan sits half a degree above horizontal, and the earth curves away beneath it, so by the time that beam reaches Mason City its centre is about 9,800 ft above ground. At that range the beam overshoots the layer where severe weather organises. The radar is describing the middle of the storm, not its base , which is why a warning for Mason City can look unsupported on the mosaic and still be right. Trust the warning over the picture.
The closest instrument actually measuring the air is KMCW · Mason City Muni on the ASOS/AWOS network, 6.4 miles away. Near enough to be representative on most days, though a summer thunderstorm can soak one and miss the other entirely.
Beam height is the standard 4/3-earth approximation for the 0.5° scan and assumes normal refraction; it is where the centre of the beam is, not its edges, and unusual temperature profiles bend it. Radar siting from the NWS WSR-88D network, station positions from the Iowa observing network as of this build.
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