From the Pentagon to the Weather Bureau, the U.S. Government is podcasting

Don’t have time to catch the morning weather forecast? If you live in the United States. the National Weather Service might have a solution. Get your weather to go in a podcast. People living in the Baltimore-Washington region can already do that. The Weather Service’s Baltimore-Washington regional office in Sterling, Va., started making daily forecasts available about a year ago as a way to experiment with the technology, said Steve Listemaa, an information technology officer in the regional office. “It’s an easier way to get our information out there,” he said.

So far, only three Weather Service offices — Sterling; El Paso, Texas; and Anchorage, Alaska —make weather podcasts available, but those examples are indicative of various agencies’ efforts to explore how they can adapt podcast technology to disseminate information about services or events.

USA.gov lists a range of government podcast topics here. One of the first agencies to move into podcasting was the Defense Department. It began offering audio downloads of programs on the Pentagon Channel — in spring 2005. The channel offers news and documentaries, among other programs. Since then, more than 7.1 million podcasts have been downloaded, said Michael Winnaker, a marketing coordinator for the channel.

Brian Natwick, general manager of the Pentagon Channel, said he got the idea during a trip to Afghanistan in 2005 with the military. As he boarded an aircraft, he noticed about 80 percent of the soldiers on board had whipped out their iPods. “It just kind of hit me that this is another distribution technique that we have to add to our model,” Natwick said.

The podcasts are an easy and inexpensive way to reach deployed troops, Natwick said. “We’re pushing voting right now,” Natwick said. “Overseas voting is really important to us.”

There are about a dozen Pentagon Channel video and audio programs available as podcasts. Among the most popular are daily news roundups and “RECON,” a monthly documentary series on topics such as operations and military history.

This month’s series is about preparing for war at the Joint Readiness Training Center. Also popular is “Fit for Duty,” a half-hour exercise program that offers resistance and strength training and pilates.

The Agriculture Department’s Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) will launch its first podcast this week and is planning two series: One is targeted to consumers; and another, with information about safety inspections, is meant to reach plant owners, managers and employees. “Different people receive information in different ways,” FSIS spokeswoman Amanda Eamich said. “It’s kind of a no-hassle approach to getting information out there.”

The Federal Aviation Administration is also exploring podcasts as a way to communicate with air traffic controllers, FAA spokeswoman Tammy Jones said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention relies on podcasts to reach some public health professionals and health care providers with updates about vaccination issues and news such as E. coli outbreaks, said Fred Smith, a senior technologist with CDC’s Division of e-Health Marketing. He also has discussed the idea of cooperating with the State Department to provide podcasts targeted at overseas travelers. “The idea is to get this set up [so] that if there is a pandemic flu,” the government can more easily deliver vital information, Smith said.

The Coast Guard’s District 13 headquartered in Seattle is eyeing podcasting as a possible recruiting tool.

The office started to offer video podcasts on its Web site in January and has purchased helmet cameras for boat crew members to wear during missions and catch some of the action for later upload, said Paul Roszkowski, an assistant public affairs officer who helped coordinate the project. “What it allows them to do is to show a recruit, or a possible recruit, the different aspects of the job,” Roszkowski said. “It’s new ground for the government.”