Laserfiche WebLink
<br />i <br /> <br />)060 <br /> <br />manner. At' the start of each field season, Professors <br />William Kruskal and K. Alexander Brownlee prepared a <br />set of sealed and . dated opaque envelopes containing <br />randomized instructions to seed or not to seed-one <br />envelope for each day of the season. A record of the <br />instructions was retained for later verification. In the <br />field on an experimental day the envelope was opened <br />only after we had completed all actions and decisions re- <br />lating to designation of an experimental day, forecasting <br />mean winds, selection of the position of the seeding line, <br />designation of seeding altitude, determination that <br />seeder planes and radar were operational and that <br />weather conditions would permit operation of the seeder <br />planes. Envelopes for days declared nonexperimental <br />(nonoperational) were returned to the University <br />unopened. . <br />Local winds were measured every two hours at the <br />West Plains Airport and were used to define a wind-borne <br />target area (plume) where measured winds could have <br />transported the seeding material. The rem~inder of the <br />exp~rimental area was designated as the control area <br />(nbnplume) and was considered to be that area within <br />the experimental circle where winds and turb~ence were <br />not likely to have carried silver iodide. Target and con- <br />trol areas were constructed in an identical fashion on all <br />experimental days. <br />In the design of the experiment the non plume control <br />area was conceived as a within-day covariate to help <br />allow for meteorological and topographical differences not <br />balanced out by randomization. Differences between <br />target and control precipitation (rainfall and radar echo <br />cover) are regarded as the primary dimensions for testing <br />seeding effects. <br />'Recognizing the data-reduction phase as one which had <br />been severely criticized on earlier projects, we took a <br />number of steps to isolate it from all knowledge about <br />seeding. <br />In the case of the surface rainfall data, rain gage <br />charts were mailed directly to Professor Wayne Decker, <br />University of Missouri, who was supported under a <br />separate NSF grant for rainfall data reduction. Only <br />after he had reduced the rainfall data to a set of tabulated <br />hourly rain amounts for each station, and reported them <br />to NSF, was he supplied with information about when <br />and where seeding took place. . <br />Integrity of radar data reduction was maintained by <br />placing a randomized identifier number inside the radar <br />camera in lieu of date identification. These numbers were <br />provided to the radar operator by Professors Brownlee <br />and Kruskal and were not available to any other person. <br />Only after the radar echo data had been extracted and <br />tabulated from the coded films was the calendar date of <br />each film identified. <br />With the exception of dispatching the seeder planes, <br />all activities on the project proceeded identically on <br />seeded and not-seeded days. Once designated for seeding, <br />a day remained in the seeded group regardless of the <br />amount of seeding material dispensed. <br /> <br />. <br /> <br /> <br />-.!'C'-i~,:',4-~~~~_~_'~.;';;" <br /> <br />Joumal of the American Statistical Association, March 1979 <br /> <br />Whitetop was a pioneering experiment. It was the first <br />large-scale randomized experiment to seed nonorQgraphic <br />swnmer convective clouds. A large fraction of the basic <br />dal~a, including all the rainfall data, was published at <br />about the sam(' time that the data became available to <br />project scientists. It was the first large seeding experi- <br />ment to be conducted in parallel with extensive physical <br />st\lldies of clouds on the seeded and not-seeded days. <br /> <br />'c I <br /> <br />3.1 Whitetop Results. <br /> <br />Analyses of the seeding results were conducted by <br />Professor Decker at the University of Missouri (Decker <br />and Schickedanz 1966; Decker, Chang, and Krause <br />19n), by Professor Neyman and associates at Berkeley <br />(Neyman, Scott; and Wells 1969; Lovasich et al. 1969, <br />19na, b), and by Whitetop scientists (Flueck .1968, <br />19n; Braham 1965; Braham, McCarthy, and Flueck <br />19n). <br />. Preliminary analyses of Whitetop data were conducted <br />by Mr. Michael Hoyle, under the supervision of Profes- <br />sors Brownlee and Kruskal. These analyses contributed <br />to papers presented at scientific meetings, but were not <br />publishe~. The main project analysis of statistical aspects <br />of lOur seeding trials was conducted, under the guidance <br />of :Professors Brownlee and Kruskal, by John A. Flueck, <br />who was able to draw on training in both physics and <br />statistics. Dr. Flueck took a data analysis point uf view, <br />placing' emphasis on "discovery, exposure and sum- <br />marization of the treatment effect relationships." His <br />published findings (Flueck 1971) consider both rain and <br />echo in the six hours reserved for seeding, the five post- <br />seeding hours, and the eleven hours combined. He also <br />considered several post-factum data partitions based on <br />meteorological factors and on distance downwind from <br />the seeding line. Complete tabulated statistical data for <br />all tests used (both' parametric and nonparametric), by <br />yes,r and across years, and for all partitions considered, <br />are given by Flueck (1971). . <br />Because of space limitations, this article only sum- <br />marizes the highlights of Whitetop results. We stress the <br />use of statistics to assess the strengths of "structural re- <br />lationships" anticipated from a knowledge of the physical <br />processes governing movement of seeding materials, in- <br />gestion of materials into cumulus clouds, and the re- <br />sponse of clouds to seeding. We also take advantage of <br />the various physical measurements and meteorological <br />studies built into the project and of subsequent findings <br />by other groups. <br />We begin by accept~ng that the effects of seeding <br />should be most pronounced in the wind-advected target <br />are:!!., which was constructed to include all the" area where <br />winds would have been likely to carry the seeding mate- <br />rial. We further accept that the control area should give <br />a measure of protection against the effects of uncontrolled <br />factors not balanced out by randomization, even if there <br />were some seeding spillover into it. Finally, we accept <br />that target-control differences should give the correct <br /> <br />....i.Iit...~.'z~:_..~ <br />