Recipe: Weather for any location

Two weather packs in Pipeworx, two coverage areas. Picking wrong is the #2 source of agent errors right now (39 failures in a 7-day window from agents calling NOAA with non-US coordinates).

Tools used: noaa.get_forecast, noaa.get_alerts, weather.get_forecast, weather.get_weather.

Calls: 1.

Decision tree

Where?	Use this pack	Why
United States (50 states + territories)	`noaa`	Native NWS source, official alerts, finer-grained forecast
Anywhere outside US	`weather` (Open-Meteo)	Global coverage, aggregated from national met agencies
Need active severe-weather alerts	`noaa.get_alerts` (US only)	NWS is the authoritative US alert source
Mixed list of locations	`weather` for all of them	Simpler than per-location routing

The shapes of failure

// Wrong: NOAA for Tokyo
noaa.get_forecast({ lat: 35.6762, lon: 139.6503 })
// → {found: false, coverage: 'us-only', hint: "Use the weather pack instead..."}

NOAA’s NWS API only serves US points. The pack now returns a structured {found: false} instead of crashing — but the agent still wastes a call. Just route correctly the first time.

Worked examples

US location with severe weather

// Forecast
noaa.get_forecast({ lat: 37.7749, lon: -122.4194 })
// → 7-period forecast with NWS detailed prose

// Active alerts for the state
noaa.get_alerts({ state: "CA" })
// → tornado warnings, flood watches, etc. with severity and affected areas

Non-US location (Tokyo, London, anywhere)

weather.get_forecast({ location: "Tokyo" })
// or
weather.get_forecast({ latitude: 35.6762, longitude: 139.6503 })
// → 7-day forecast with high/low, precipitation chance

Just current conditions

weather.get_weather({ location: "Denver" })
// → temp, humidity, wind, conditions

Auto-routing pattern

If your agent might receive any global coordinate:

const isUS = lon > -125 && lon < -66 && lat > 24 && lat < 50  // CONUS bbox
// Add Alaska / Hawaii / territories ranges if you want full US coverage

const forecast = isUS
  ? await noaa.get_forecast({ lat, lon })
  : await weather.get_forecast({ latitude: lat, longitude: lon })

Or skip the bbox check entirely and always use weather unless you specifically need NOAA’s US-specific alerts/products. Open-Meteo aggregates NOAA data for US points, so you don’t lose US accuracy.

Citation pattern

Forecast for Tokyo (next 24h) shows highs near 22°C with light rain, per Open-Meteo aggregated from JMA. For US severe weather, follow NWS active alerts.

Caveats

NOAA hits the gateway 5-min default cache. Forecasts update every few hours, so this is fine. For severe-weather alerts, agents should Cache-Control: no-cache if available.
Open-Meteo timezone defaults to UTC. The response includes the location’s timezone — convert client-side when displaying to users.
Forecast accuracy degrades after day 3. Day 7+ is “directional weather signal,” not a confident prediction. Don’t quote 10-day forecasts as facts.
No global severe-weather alerts source in Pipeworx today. If you need typhoon/cyclone warnings outside the US, file via pipeworx_feedback.