This being my first day really focusing on the ETN data, my initial thoughts on the thunderstorm alerts in the warning operations environment is that is can be useful to identify when storms are becoming electrified but I find myself gravitating to only looking at the DTA (Dangerous Thunderstorm Alerts) as opposed to all three thunderstorm alerts. As others have mentioned I concur that the length of time that the alert boxes remain on the screen is entirely too long (45 minutes).  In some cases, the storm has completely dissipated or moved well outside of the alert box and the boxes become more of a distraction in my opinion.  I think a reasonable time frame for the alert boxes would be 15 minutes or 20 minutes max.

Jack Bauer