Before Lloyd Hetrick gets into the pilot’s seat of an airplane, he takes a few minutes to get on the Internet and check out the National Weather Service forecasts.

Not a good idea, he said, to leave the ground without knowing what’s going on in the air.

“You don’t go anywhere without checking the weather,” said Hetrick, a pilot who privately runs Lawrence Municipal Airport for City Hall. “We can’t exist without the weather.”

Now Hetrick and other pilots are worried about a bill in the U.S. Senate that would order the National Weather Service not to compete with private companies. Some critics say the proposal would limit the service’s ability to make weather information available to aviators, farmers and other members of the public.

The battle over who owns weather information — the public or private sectors — could affect farmers, utilities and anybody else who relies on government-produced weather data and alerts.

“That’s a government entity that provides that service for the public,” Hetrick said. “Why shouldn’t they be able to share it?”

Barry Myers is vice president of AccuWeather, a Pennsylvania company that provides forecasts to Web sites, newspapers and broadcast stations.

“Government’s there to protect the citizens,” Myers told the Journal-World, “not to be a competitor to private business.”

Public vs. private

An airplane takes off Thursday from the Lawrence Municipal Airport. A measure in the U.S. Senate would restrict the National Weather Service from competing with private business in providing weather information. Pilots worry that the bill will compromise their ability to make informed decisions about flight conditions.

The National Weather Service last year repealed its policy against competing with private weather forecasters. When the rule changed, the NWS and its parent agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), expanded into areas already served by the commercial weather industry, according to Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Rick Santorum.

That’s why Santorum, whose state is home to 14 such companies, proposed getting the agencies out of competition with private industry.

The bill, as written, would still allow the National Weather Service to provide severe weather warnings to the public. But it insists that the service not provide “a service or product … that is or could be provided by the private sector.”

Myers said the bill was intended to keep for-profit businesses — like newspapers, utility companies, energy traders and agricultural interests — from getting taxpayer-financed weather data.

“If they want that information, they should pay for it,” he said. “If agribusiness wants information about whether the frost is going to hurt the citrus crop, they should pay for it.”

A spokesman for U.S. Sen. Pat Roberts, R-Kan., a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee, said Thursday that Roberts would oppose the bill.

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Some skeptics

But in Kansas, farmers didn’t seem that concerned.

Steve Wilson, owner of Baldwin Feed and Grain, said farmers have plenty of free sources for the weather information they need.

“I don’t feel like I’m locked into just one source,” Wilson said.

Mike Matson, a spokesman for Kansas Farm Bureau, added that the bill is “not on (the) radar” at his organization.

Pilot Alan Bass, of Executive Airshare of Wichita, checks the weather in the pilots lounge at the Lawrence Municipal Airport. Bass was waiting for his passengers, who flew into Lawrence Thursday. Pilots, who rely heavily on weather predictions, are worried about the potential privatization of weather information.

There are skeptics, however. The Aircraft Owners and Pilots Assn. said the bill was so broadly written the National Weather Service could be prevented from distributing weather data to the Federal Aviation Administration that pilots use.

“The government has an obligation to protect the safety of flights, and weather is the single greatest factor in determining the safe conclusion of a flight,” said Chris Dancy, a spokesman for the organization.

Myers dismissed such concerns, but seemed to acknowledge that deciding the final restrictions on the National Weather Service could be tricky.

“There’s a blurred distinction,” he said. “Private industry can provide whatever it wants to provide.”

Hetrick, meanwhile, is concerned he’ll have to shell out more money to obtain the basic information he needs to fly.

“I don’t see it being a good thing,” he said. “It costs enough to fly now, let alone paying for additional services.”

— The Associated Press contributed to this report.