Arlene Laing
Coordinating Director, Caribbean Meteorological Organization, Headquarters Unit
Dr. Arlene Laing is the Coordinating Director at the Caribbean Meteorological Organization (CMO) Headquarters Unit and Permanent Representative of the British Caribbean Territories with WMO. She is a member of the WMO Executive Council and Research Board.
Laing is known for research across tropical meteorology; thunderstorm systems; flash floods and mitigation; satellite meteorology; lightning and El Niño; tropical cyclone rainfall and genesis; weather, climate and meningitis; climate and armed conflict; and volcanic ash fall modeling. She is the lead author of “Introduction to Tropical Meteorology”, a peer-reviewed online textbook. She is also a co-author and Editorial Committee member of the award-winning, “Meteorology of Tropical West Africa; The Forecasters’ handbook”.
After obtaining her B.Sc. (Hons) from the University of the West Indies, she worked as a forecaster in Jamaica. She then received an Organization of American States fellowship to pursue graduate studies in meteorology at Pennsylvania State University. Subsequently, she held various posts, including assistant professor, University of South Florida; scientist, National Center for Atmospheric Research; project facilitator, US Weather Prediction Center.
SPEAKERS & MODERATORS
Jerome Aucan
Head of the Pacific Community Center for Ocean Science, The Pacific Community (SPC), Fiji/New Caledonia
Claudia C. Baron-Aguilar
Ph.D. student, University of South Florida (USF) & Member of the Wayuu indigenous community
Silvia Chacon-Barrantes
Coordinator, National Tsunami Monitoring System (SINAMOT)
Professor, National University of Costa Rica
Anna-Katharina Hornidge
Director, German Development Institute/Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE), Germany
Simone Pennafirme
Manager, Marine Life Center, Secretariat for Environment of the City Hall of Rio de Janeiro
Jacqueline Yamileth Rivera Ayala
Civil engineer and vulcanological monitoring coordinator, Hazards Monitoring Center, DOA, MARN
Emiliano Rodriguez Nuesch
Director at Pacifico risk communications agency and consultant in risk communications and behavioral science
Vladimir Ryabinin
Executive Secretary, the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of UNESCO
Raul Salazar
Chief of the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR), Secretariat for the Americas, Panama
Ria Sen
Lead Preparedness Officer, Global Emergency Telecommunications Cluster, World Food Programme
Sebastian Unger
Head of Ocean Governance Research Group, Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies (IASS), Potsdam, Germany
Christa von Hillebrandt-Andrade
Deputy Director, International Tsunami Information Center, Caribbean Office, Puerto Rico