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Millersville University alumnus Timothy Loftus ’11, director of data science at AccuWeather, has received the Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Advance of Applied Meteorology from the American Meteorological Society .
The award honors Loftus “for pioneering AI methods to create value-added meteorological datasets, significantly enhancing business and stakeholder decision-making and operational efficiency,” according to AMS.
Loftus earned a Bachelor of Science in meteorology in 2011 and a Master of Science in integrated scientific applications in 2015 from Millersville. As director of data science at AccuWeather, he works to tackle weather challenges using artificial intelligence, develop new products and services, and further improve the AccuWeather forecast engine.
Loftus has worked for AccuWeather for nearly nine years, serving as business intelligence analyst, data scientist ll and lll, and manager of data science before assuming his current position. He also served for two years as a solution engineer at Esri, the global market leader in geographic information systems software, location intelligence and mapping.
“Leveraging data science and applying different techniques against large volumes of weather data to generate insights that others can take and use within their own business operations – that’s always been my goal and it all started at Millersville University,” says Loftus. He credits the courses and professors at Millersville for shaping his future career, particularly Dr. Richard Clark, professor emeritus of meteorology, and Dr. Sepideh Yalda, professor of meteorology
“I especially loved including Climate Applications, GIS, Statistical Methods I & II, Statistical Meteorology and Weather Derivatives. Those courses helped develop the skills and expertise needed to fulfill my responsibilities as a solution engineer for the largest GIS company in the world, ESRI and now, as director of data science at AccuWeather.”
To current and future meteorology students, Loftus offers this advice: “Follow what truly makes you come alive; the world needs more people who have come alive.”
