High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! A small craft advisory is a type of warning issued by the National Weather Service in the United States, most frequently in coastal areas. It is issued when winds have reached, or are expected to reach within 12 hours, a speed marginally less than that which is considered gale force. Exact parameters for what wind speed triggers the advisory have been changed over time. Until the late 1960s, a range of 32 to 38 miles per hour (or 28 to 33 knots) was observed; then the lower limit was reduced to 23 miles per hour (20 knots). Today, however, it is more common in most places to use 25 to 38 miles per hour (22 to 33 knots) as the standard, thus neatly encompassing the combined ranges of forces 6 and 7 on the Beaufort scale.