My WebLink
|
Help
|
About
|
Sign Out
Home
Browse
Search
WMOD00447
CWCB
>
Weather Modification
>
DayForward
>
WMOD00447
Metadata
Thumbnails
Annotations
Entry Properties
Last modified
7/28/2009 2:39:20 PM
Creation date
4/18/2008 10:02:52 AM
Metadata
Fields
Template:
Weather Modification
Title
Interagency Agreement Funds Usage Period Report - February 2001
Date
2/1/2001
Weather Modification - Doc Type
Report
There are no annotations on this page.
Document management portal powered by Laserfiche WebLink 9 © 1998-2015
Laserfiche.
All rights reserved.
/
22
PDF
Print
Pages to print
Enter page numbers and/or page ranges separated by commas. For example, 1,3,5-12.
After downloading, print the document using a PDF reader (e.g. Adobe Reader).
Show annotations
View images
View plain text
<br />. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br />presumed to provide the best estimate. This scheme could be modified to weight the <br />accumulation values by range, thereby giving some emphasis to measurements from each radar. <br />This latter approach would provide a smoother pattern than the existing scheme which sometimes <br />has discontinuities along the straight line representing equal distances from two adjoining radars. <br />However, the intent of the current scheme is to emplhasize such differences. Since the Ze-S <br />relation, range correction scheme and all adaptable parameter settings are identical for all 5 of the <br />radars, differences between adjoining radars are most likely related to calibration errors, or <br />possibly to an antenna being out of level. <br /> <br />It has been found that the SAA products from the Aberdeen, Grand Forks and Minneapolis radars <br />are usually in good agreement along their respectivE~ equal range lines. That is, little or no <br />discontinuity is seen in resulting merged snow accumulation patterns. Conversely, the Bismarck <br />radar and especially the Duluth radar consistently provide lowest accumulations than their <br />neighbors. Therefore, it is suspected that these two radars may be "running cold," providing <br />erroneously low reflectivity values because of calibration problems. An alternative explanation is <br />that the other 3 radars are all "running hot." The latte~r possibility seems less likely since all 3 <br />radars would have to have very similar calibration errors because they agree with one another. <br />As noted, having an antenna out of level could result in the observed errors. This is considered <br />unlikely because it should be easy to maintain proper antenna leveling. <br /> <br />These findings of differences among radar snow estimates have been pointed out to personnel <br />at the NEXRAD Operational Support Facility and the Duluth NWS Forecast Office. Maintaining <br />proper radar calibrations across the national network: is clearly the responsibility of the three <br />agencies operating the network. <br /> <br />One may view many SAA graphical products for the 5 individual radars for the past 1, 2, 3 and 6 <br />h. The merged HRAP field for all 5 radars is provided for the past 3 and 6 h. All of these products <br />are updated each hour. Fixed 6 hand 24 h periods are also displayed for the past week. The <br />Reclamation web site with SAA products is: www.usbr.gov/rsmg/ click on NEXRAD Snow <br />Algorithm Products. <br /> <br />Posting of these many products was done at the request of NWS personnel at Chanhassen, MN. <br />Once it was realized that Reclamation was already calculating hourly products and summing them <br />for the daily periods desired by NOHRSC, providing short-term areal distributions of SWE and SO <br />for NWS forecasters and others seemed to be an obtainable goal. While production and display <br />of these SAA products was beyond the scope of the Goals stated above, there was a clear need <br />for such products by NWS Forecast Offices. This was especially obvious to the Chanhassen <br />NWS personnel because they had used the SAA in real time during 1996-97 winter field tests with <br />Level II reflectivites. They were well aware of the value of the SAA snow estimates (Naistat et al. <br />1998), and desired to have them available once again. <br /> <br />The Chanhassen Forecast Office has provide considerable valuable feedback which is helping <br />us improve the SAA products as the winter progresses. For example, the minimum dBZ value <br />converted to non-zero precipitation has been shifted 3 times in an attempt to balance good <br />performance during snow storms with minimizing false snowfall indications during virga episodes <br />caused by reflectivites from mid-level clouds. Test runs were also made with and without range <br />correction since range correction exacerbates the virlga contamination problem. The current <br />approach uses range correction and the lowest minimum reflectivity possible with N I OS data which <br /> <br />4 <br />
The URL can be used to link to this page
Your browser does not support the video tag.