STAR-BULLETIN / MARCH 2002
Gulfstream IV hurricane surveillance jets like this one have returned to Honolulu as part of a program to collect data to forecast severe storm systems developing in the Pacific.
NASA and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration scientists are conducting flights out of Honolulu through March 12 to collect information to forecast severe storm systems developing in the Pacific. Storm data flights
fan out from islesInformation gathered will help
improve weather forecastsStar-Bulletin staff
This is the third year for the Winter Storms Reconnaissance Program with NOAA scientists aboard a Gulfstream IV (G-IV) hurricane surveillance jet dropping highly sensitive devices called dropsondes in strategic parts of the atmosphere.
As they fall toward the ocean, dropsondes measure temperature, wind speed, humidity and surface pressure, which are relayed in real time to supercomputer weather models.
The information enables meteorologists to forecast winter weather events up to 12 hours earlier than is possible without the observations.
Data from this year's program are being shared with an international atmospheric research project called THORPEX (the Observing System Research and Predictability Experiment).
Scientists from 11 countries are working together in that program to improve atmospheric observing systems, data assimilation, predictability and economic and societal applications of weather forecasts.
NASA scientists joined NOAA here to test the THORPEX observing system with data collected by NOAA's G-IV storm chaser and NASA's Lockheed ER-2 high-altitude surveillance aircraft.
The information is expected to help scientists improve medium- and long-range weather forecasts, study oceanic weather, improve aviation weather predictions and test future weather satellite measurement concepts.
The G-IV flies below the ER-2, collecting data for ground-truthing and validation of the ER-2 sensors developed by NASA to fly on the next generation of operational NOAA weather satellites.
The scientists are operating from Air Services Hawaii at Honolulu Airport.
Winter Storms Reconnaissance Program
NOAA
NASA
