Florence Rabier

Florence Rabier
Florence Rabier
Born	1964 (age 60–61)
Alma mater	Université Pierre et Marie Curie École nationale de la météorologie Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier University
Scientific career
Institutions	European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts Météo-France
Thesis	Assimilation variationnelle de donnees meteorologiques en presence d'instabilite barocline  (1992)

Florence Rabier (born 1964) is a French meteorologist who is director-general of the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts. She works on numerical weather prediction (NWP). She was appointed a Knight of the Legion of Honour in 2014.

Early life and education

Rabier joined Météo-France as an undergraduate engineer in meteorology from the École nationale de la météorologie. ^[1] After completing her undergraduate she joined the Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier University, where she earned a master's degree in meteorology. ^[1] She moved to the University of Paris (Pierre and Marie Curie University) for her doctoral studies, where she researched variational assimilation of meteorological observations in the presence of baroclinic instabilities. ^[2]

Research and career

From 1992 to 1998, Rabier worked at the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF), ^[3] where she developed four dimensional variational data assimilation methods for NWP.

In 2008 she returned to Météo-France, where she was head of the observations team and then, from 2011, deputy director of GMAP (Groupe de Modélisation pour l'Assimilation et la Prévision). She improved methods for assimilating satellite observations in NWP. ^[4]

She worked on data from the Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer (IASI), an instrument on European meteorological satellites which provides information on atmospheric temperature and humidity profiles. IASI has been operating since 2007 and has considerably improved operational meteorology. During the International Polar Year (2007–2008) she participated in a field campaign over Antarctica. ^[5]

Rabier moved back to the ECMWF in 2013, where she served as Director of Forecasts. In 2016 Rabier was appointed Director-General of ECMWF. ^[4] She was Chair of the European Space Agency Advisory Committee on Earth Observations from 2021 to 2023. ^[6] From 2021, she has been a member of the international scientific board of the IFAB (International Foundation for Artificial Intelligence and Big Data). ^[7] In 2022, she was promoted to Ingenieur general de classe exceptionnelle. ^[3]

Awards and honours

• 1994 Prix Prudhomme
• 2014 Chevalier de la Légion d'honneur ^[8]
• 2014 Académie de l'air et de l'espace Grand Prix de l'Académie
• 2022 Honorary Member American Meteorological Society ^{[9] [10]}
• 2024 French Academy of Technologies ^[11]

Selected publications

• Rabier, F.; Järvinen, H.; Klinker, E.; Mahfouf, J.-F.; Simmons, A. (April 2000). "The ECMWF operational implementation of four-dimensional variational assimilation. I: Experimental results with simplified physics". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. 126 (564): 1143–1170. Bibcode:2000QJRMS.126.1143R. doi:10.1002/qj.49712656415.
• Rabier, F.; McNally, A.; Andersson, E.; Courtier, P.; Undén, P.; Eyre, J.; Hollingsworth, A.; Bouttier, F. (July 1998). "The ECMWF implementation of three-dimensional variational assimilation (3D-Var). II: Structure functions". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. 124 (550): 1809–1829. Bibcode:1998QJRMS.124.1809R. doi:10.1002/qj.49712455003.
• Klinker, E.; Rabier, F.; Kelly, G.; Mahfouf, J.-F. (April 2000). "The ecmwf operational implementation of four-dimensional variational assimilation. III: Experimental results and diagnostics with operational configuration". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. 126 (564): 1191–1215. Bibcode:2000QJRMS.126.1191K. doi:10.1002/qj.49712656417.
• Rabier, F.; Klinker, E.; Courtier, P.; Hollingsworth, A. (January 1996). "Sensitivity of forecast errors to initial conditions". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. 122 (529): 121–150. Bibcode:1996QJRMS.122..121R. doi:10.1002/qj.49712252906.
• Rabier, Florence; Fourrié, Nadia; Chafäi, Djalil; Prunet, Pascal (April 2002). "Channel selection methods for Infrared Atmospheric Sounding Interferometer radiances". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. 128 (581): 1011–1027. Bibcode:2002QJRMS.128.1011R. doi:10.1256/0035900021643638.
• Liu, Z.-Q.; Rabier, F. (October 2003). "The potential of high-density observations for numerical weather prediction: A study with simulated observations". Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society. 129 (594): 3013–3035. Bibcode:2003QJRMS.129.3013L. doi:10.1256/qj.02.170.
• Rabier, Florence; Bouchard, Aurélie; Brun, Eric; Doerenbecher, Alexis; Guedj, Stéphanie; Guidard, Vincent; Karbou, Fatima; Peuch, Vincent-Henri; El Amraoui, Laaziz; Puech, Dominique; Genthon, Christophe; Picard, Ghislain; Town, Michael; Hertzog, Albert; Vial, François; Cocquerez, Philippe; Cohn, Stephen A.; Hock, Terry; Fox, Jack; Cole, Hal; Parsons, David; Powers, Jordan; Romberg, Keith; VanAndel, Joseph; Deshler, Terry; Mercer, Jennifer; Haase, Jennifer S.; Avallone, Linnea; Kalnajs, Lars; Mechoso, C. Roberto; Tangborn, Andrew; Pellegrini, Andrea; Frenot, Yves; Thépaut, Jean-Noël; McNally, Anthony; Balsamo, Gianpaolo; Steinle, Peter (January 2010). "The Concordiasi Project in Antarctica". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 91 (1): 69–86. Bibcode:2010BAMS...91...69R. doi:10.1175/2009BAMS2764.1.
• Venuti, Fabio; Rabier, Florence; Andersson, Erik; Modigliani, Umberto; English, Stephen; Kitchen, Christine; Berrone, Matthieu; Pinsault, Dorian; Debrux, Julie; Jarraud, Michel (June 2025). "ECMWF's societal impact through service provision, partnerships and collaborations". Journal of the European Meteorological Society. 2 100013. doi: 10.1016/j.jemets.2025.100013 .
• Magnusson, L.; Bidlot, J.-R.; Bonavita, M.; Brown, A. R.; Browne, P. A.; De Chiara, G.; Dahoui, M.; Lang, S. T. K.; McNally, T.; Mogensen, K. S.; Pappenberger, F.; Prates, F.; Rabier, F.; Richardson, D. S.; Vitart, F.; Malardel, S. (March 2019). "ECMWF Activities for Improved Hurricane Forecasts". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 100 (3): 445–458. Bibcode:2019BAMS..100..445M. doi:10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0044.1.
• Ben Bouallègue, Zied; Clare, Mariana C. A.; Magnusson, Linus; Gascón, Estibaliz; Maier-Gerber, Michael; Janoušek, Martin; Rodwell, Mark; Pinault, Florian; Dramsch, Jesper S.; Lang, Simon T. K.; Raoult, Baudouin; Rabier, Florence; Chevallier, Matthieu; Sandu, Irina; Dueben, Peter; Chantry, Matthew; Pappenberger, Florian (June 2024). "The Rise of Data-Driven Weather Forecasting: A First Statistical Assessment of Machine Learning–Based Weather Forecasts in an Operational-Like Context". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 105 (6): E864 –E883. arXiv: 2307.10128 . doi:10.1175/BAMS-D-23-0162.1.

References

1. "Florence Rabier". ORCID. 2022. Retrieved 2022-04-06.
2. Rabier, Florence (1992). Assimilation variationnelle de donnees meteorologiques en presence d'instabilite barocline[Variational assimilation of meteorological data in the presence of baroclinic instability] (Thesis) (in French). OCLC   490320856.^{[ non-primary source needed ][ page needed ]}
3. "Arrêté du 10 mars 2022 portant promotion au grade d'ingénieur général des ponts, des eaux et des forêts de classe exceptionnelle" [Order of March 10, 2022 promoting to the rank of general engineer of bridges, water and forests of exceptional class](PDF) (in French). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2022-03-19.
4. "FLORENCE RABIER APPOINTED DIRECTOR GENERAL OF ECMWF (European Centre for (...) - MeteoLux - Portail Météo Luxembourg". meteolux.lu. Retrieved 2021-12-27.
5. Rabier, Florence; Cohn, Steve; Cocquerez, Philippe; Hertzog, Albert; Avallone, Linnea; Deshler, Terry; Haase, Jennifer; Hock, Terry; Doerenbecher, Alexis; Wang, Junhong; Guidard, Vincent; Thépaut, Jean-Noël; Langland, Rolf; Tangborn, Andrew; Balsamo, Gianpaolo; Brun, Eric; Parsons, David; Bordereau, Jérôme; Cardinali, Carla; Danis, François; Escarnot, Jean-Pierre; Fourrié, Nadia; Gelaro, Ron; Genthon, Christophe; Ide, Kayo; Kalnajs, Lars; Martin, Charlie; Meunier, Louis-François; Nicot, Jean-Marc; Perttula, Tuuli; Potts, Nicholas; Ragazzo, Patrick; Richardson, David; Sosa-Sesma, Sergio; Vargas, André (March 2013). "The Concordiasi Field Experiment over Antarctica: First Results from Innovative Atmospheric Measurements". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society. 94 (3): ES17 –ES20. Bibcode:2013BAMS...94S..17R. doi: 10.1175/BAMS-D-12-00005.1 .^{[ non-primary source needed ]}
6. "Copernicus: ECMWF signs agreement with the European Commission for next phase of climate and atmosphere monitoring services | Copernicus". atmosphere.copernicus.eu. Retrieved 2021-12-27.
7. "International Scientific Board - IFAB International Foundation". 2020-10-02. Retrieved 2025-06-11.
8. "Décret du 31 décembre 2013 portant promotion et nomination - Légifrance". legifrance.gouv.fr (in French). Archived from the original on 2024-10-04. Retrieved 2025-06-11.
9. "List of Honorary Members". American Meteorological Society. Retrieved 2025-06-11.
10. "2021 Awards and Honors Recipients". American Meteorological Society. Retrieved 2025-06-11.
11. "Décret du 26 février 2024 portant approbation d'élections à l'Académie des technologies - Légifrance". Archived from the original on 2024-02-28. Retrieved 2025-07-08.