Rate My Professor Suzanne Gray

Her research focuses on dynamical meteorology at scales relevant to weather systems, including mesoscale processes, dynamics and predictability of extratropical, Arctic, and Mediterranean cyclones, ensemble forecasting, weather phenomena climatology, and midlatitude convection, with particular emphasis on sting jets—descending jets causing localized extreme winds in storms. Gray has led or co-led major NERC-funded projects, including DIAMET (diabatic influences on mesoscale structures in extratropical storms), where she directed the first research aircraft flight into a sting jet storm; sting jet precursor tools for forecasters; FRANC (forecasting rainfall); PRESTO (precipitation over orography); Arctic summertime cyclones; and ongoing Diabatic influences on current and future hazardous Mediterranean cyclones (2024-2028) and CLOUDY TIME on convective interactions (2023-2026). Key publications encompass 'CISK or WISHE as the mechanism for tropical cyclone intensification' (Journal of the Atmospheric Sciences, 1996), 'Scientific challenges of convective-scale numerical weather prediction' (Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, 2018), 'Diabatic processes modifying potential vorticity in a North Atlantic cyclone' (Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society, 2013), and 'A global climatology of sting-jet extratropical cyclones' (Weather and Climate Dynamics, 2024). She received the Royal Meteorological Society's Buchan Prize in 2016 and L.F. Richardson Prize in 2001. Collaborating with the Met Office and insurance industry, her contributions advance extreme weather forecasting and climate impact assessments.