Laserfiche WebLink
<br />I~ <br />, <br /> <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />- I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br />I <br /> <br />Duringthe season we often interact with local law enforcement, giving dispatchers <br />information about storm spotter placements; also, occasionally, dispatchers provide feed-back <br />pertinent late-breaking weather-related information to us, <br /> <br />Off-season changes in Internet data collection protocol and upgraded program revisions <br />between seasons were monitored by one of our meteorological assistants, Sam Gardner. Our <br />Internet home page was re-created and maintained this summer by Assistant Meteorologist, Todd <br />Chambers. During the season a variety of general information was made accessible to the public <br />via the Internet, among them the Lakin radar displays during operational periods. For regional <br />residents, especially in rural areas, having access to radar data to track storm movements can be <br />very important and timely information for them. The loops are updated every few minutes as <br />operations permit. Storm sequences were usually kept on the web site for 2 - 3 days, or longer, <br />before being moved to the archive files. <br /> <br />The Internet and electronic-mail (e-mail) address is, respectively: <br /> <br />Lakin Internet: http://users.pld.comlhailman <br /> <br />Lakin E-mail: hailman@pld.com <br /> <br />B. WEATHER SURVEILLANCE - RADAR, SATELLITE, TV AND VISUAL <br /> <br />Watching for sudden, severe weather developments and being aware of the general <br />suitability of the likelihood of severe weather is a continuous effort throughout the 24-hour day, <br />irrespective of the daily forecast. Although the media provides us with a means of obtaining local <br />area forecasts, breaking weather warnings and radar displays, it is peripheral to our own local <br />sources of information such as our radar, personal observations, satellite imagery, wind profiler <br />displays and a variety of Weather Tap analyses displaying NEXRAD data. <br /> <br />In order to reduce hail effectively, it is important to be able to identify and begin seeding a <br />severe storm as early in its growth stage as possible. Recognizing non-severe storms opposed to <br />potentially destructive ones by visual means requires a fair degree of expertise and experience. At <br />some point WKWMP pilots and meteorologists eventually acquire the ability to do this with a <br />, fairly high level of reliability. Often this recognition skill is critical to getting flights launched in <br />a timely manner. We prefer not to wait for high radar reflectivity in a cloud to be seen on radar <br />before launching aircraft. The reason for this is because In rapidly growing clouds, cloud droplet <br />sizes are not large enough to be "seen" on radar until relatively late in the initial development of <br />severe storms, perhaps as long as IS minutes, or more, When severe storms are seen on radar it is <br />far too late in their life-cycles to effectively reduce the first hail in them, <br /> <br />Radar becomes an indispensable tool in the identification and tracking of severe storms <br />once they form. The type of radar system used is the Enterprise Electronics Corporation (EEC) <br />WR-IOO, 5-cm wavelength model, nearly identical to many weather radars previously used by <br />the National Weather Service which were replaced by their current lO-centimeter wavelength <br />NEXRAD Doppler systems. <br /> <br />19 <br />